Disaster

 You don't expect hurricanes in the mountains.

Mast Store Annex in Valle Cruces.

But the remnants of Hurricane Helene absolutely devastated western North Carolina and parts of eastern Tennessee on Friday when her unlikely path of destruction brought a trail of misery from the Florida gulf to deep within the mountains of the Blue Ridge.

You expect blizzards to bring the mountains to a standstill. Not tropical storms.

And yet nearly two feet of water have inundated and isolated historic Asheville; rock slides have taken out portions of I-40, maiming a critical transportation artery for perhaps months; and cell towers have collapsed in the face of 60 mile per hour (or higher) gusts, shutting down communications. Power is gone for hundreds of thousands.

All roads in western North Carolina are closed. Asheville, at one point, was approachable only by air.

It could take years for recovery.

In 1989, Hurricane Hugo took a similar path after making landfall, only much closer to Charlotte. By the time it reached us, it, too, was a tropical storm, but I remember trees down all over the place. I mean, heck, we lived on a street called Woodsway Drive.

The Village of Chimney Rock.

 But we also lived on a hill, so flooding was never a problem for us. It was mostly the cleanup and power outages, as I recall. It might have been different for others.

It looks to be considerably worse for western North Carolina. As of Saturday morning, emergency crews in Buncombe County responded to more than 5,000 calls and performed more than 150 swiftwater rescues.

In Asheville, the largest North Carolina town in the mountains, flooding from the French Broad and Swannanoa rivers clobbered Biltmore Village and the River Arts District. In Boone, home to Appalachian State University, famous King Street was turned into a torrent of water.

Chimney Rock Village, a popular and scenic destination location, has been washed off the map.

The Lake Lure Dam was close to imminent failure for up to nine hours before Rutherford County engineers lifted the warning to evacuate.

There is also a political angle to this story. Helene was created in the gulf by unusually warm waters and intensified into a Category 4 hurricane when it made landfall in the Florida Bend area. The heated gulf waters added more moisture to the storm, causing heavier rainfalls than previously recorded

One element of Project 2025 – the Republican blueprint and its proposed agenda should it win the general election in November – is to defund FEMA, an agency critical in aiding natural disaster victims. The Project is also looking to shut down the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Weather Service for no other reason than I guess they don't believe in science.

And yet, the empirical evidence we have to keep these agencies is in our own backyard.

Jim

I figure the first time I ran into Jim Lippard was probably sometime around 1977. I was an export from Pennsylvania grasping how to be a sports writer for The Dispatch. I'd just arrived a few months earlier – in the middle of football season – and I was still learning the local ropes.

I can't say precisely how or when we met, but I can take a reasonable guess. I bet I was at a baseball game, and more precisely, an American Legion Post 8 baseball game at Holt-Moffitt Field.

Jim Lippard and the Order of the Long Leaf Pine.

In addition to covering the game while keeping score and taking notes, I also had to occasionally take pictures. Serious camera work was unfamiliar to me, but there was this guy out there, working inside the fence, snapping away with his Nikon. I assumed he was from another newspaper and I thought nothing of it. Turns out, Jim was the Post 8 photographer and he was as much a familiar part of the game as a well-worn glove or a favorite baseball bat.

And I bet you a dime to a dollar, he's the one who came up to me and introduced himself. I know there was a smile in that introduction and a friendliness in his personality that simply embraced you. He made you feel comfortable almost immediately.

Over time he taught me little tricks that he'd picked up about shooting baseball games. If there was a runner on first, focus on second in case there was a steal or the start of a double play. If there was a runner on second, go ahead and focus on home plate for a potential play at the plate. Stuff like that.

Within a few years, Jim became the Post 8 athletic director and we saw more and more of each other. Then he became Post 8 commander, and after that, Area III commissioner. Meanwhile, I'd become the sports editor for The Dispatch, and our paths seemingly crossed all the time as fortune favored both of us.

There was another reason our paths crossed: my expanding waistline. By 1984, Jim had opened his own tailor shop on East First Avenue and it seemed like I was always going in for alterations. Or maybe it was for the conversation, I don't know. His shop, in fact, was a meeting place for hundreds – perhaps even thousands – of patrons and his outgoing personality seemed boundless. I think his personality alone would have provided him with a comfortable living, but geez, he was a damn good tailor, too. And pretty much self-taught.

Somewhere in the middle of all of this, Jim had a vision: after deep research, consultation and hard work, he founded the Davidson County Sports Hall of Fame in 2002. I always thought the Hall of Fame was an important element in the county's sports culture and it warms me to this day to know that Jim was the driving force behind it. I think this creation of his may be his lasting legacy.

By 2000, he was inducted into the North Carolina American Legion Baseball Hall of Fame and in 2009, he was inducted into the very Hall of Fame he created. Then, in 2015, he received the Order of the Long Leaf Pine, the highest honor a civilian can receive in North Carolina.

But of all of his achievements, the thing I think he was most proud of was his family. He adored his three daughters – Jamie, Lisa and Julie – and was forever in love with Ann, his wife of 67 years. It just never got better than that for him.

The other day, Kim and I were taking our daily walk when my cell phone rang. The caller ID told me it was Jamie and even before I answered, I caught my breath. I could guess what was coming. And then, "Daddy died today."

Jim was 88.

I reflected on all of this the past few days and as I thought about it, I realized my friendship with Jim was one of my oldest, spanning more than 40 years. How could I ever know that would happen back in 1977?

It's been said that in our essence, we are stardust, nurturing the basic elements of the universe within ourselves. Goodness. Kindness. Vision. Charity. Friendship. Family.

Stardust. Jim was all of that, and for that, I am forever grateful.

The evisceration

Almost immediately after Kamala Harris' takedown of adjudicated rapist and 34-times convicted felon Donald Trump following their presidential debate Tuesday night, one of the first things I thought was how easy it seemed for her to politically undress and expose this incredibly weak and immoral blowhard.

The second thing I thought was why couldn't this have been done eight years ago? Why did this nation have to endure for so long Trump's lethal incompetency while he was president and his hateful poison when he was out of office?

I guess it was because eight years ago, Harris wasn't available back then for the evisceration. She was honing her skills as a U.S. Senator, not as a presidential candidate.

But on Tuesday, Harris cut through Trump like a hot knife through butter. No, wait. Too cliché. Like a weedeater through dead grass. No, wait. Like a Shakespearean soliloquy through a vacant soul. Something somewhere along those lines.

It looked too easy. Harris, the former prosecutor, set the bait all night long and Trump, a true narcissistic simpleton, just couldn't resist. Herewith: his campaign crowds are small and bored; he has no healthcare plan ("I have the concept of a plan"); his immigration policies are criminal. And so is he.

You could almost physically see her digs burrow under his thin skin and see his orange makeup turn white around his mouth and eye sockets like a sorry clown. It was incredible television.

No wonder Trump doesn't want to debate her again. Coward. Must be those bone spurs acting up. As each minute of the debate passed, he became angrier and more rattled. She became, well, more presidential.

The absurdist moment came when Trump insisted Haitian immigrants were eating the pets of people living in Springfield, Ohio. The planned attack, inspired by neo-Nazis, serves nothing more than to illustrate his innate racism, particularly against black and brown-skinned people. His xenophobia knows no bounds. How is this presidential?

Why is this cockroach even allowed to run for office?

I have no idea how the election is going to turn out 51 days from now. Republicans in power in key states are doing their best to purge voter rolls and other acts of voter suppression reminiscent of Jim Crow days.

But Harris seems to be building momentum.

Can she do it?

There are two inherent strikes against her: she's Black. And she's a woman. In this country, where it took women 131 years to get the vote after the Constitution was ratified, gender politics is still a thing. And so are the politics of race where the vestiges of America's Original Sin (slavery) still lingers in the air like lingering swamp gas.

Moments after the debate ended, the Trump campaign was delivered a blow when megastar pop singer Taylor Swift announced her endorsement of Harris for president. In the real world, star-powered endorsements are nice to have but usually don't move the political needle one way or the other.

This might be different. Within 24 hours of her announcement, there were more than 300,000 newly registered voters in the books.  And most likely, they were probably voting age females, which is significant in a world where women have lost their constitutional right to an abortion after the reversal of Roe v. Wade.

As a side note, I'm going to take a guess here. Swift is from Pennsylvania. West Reading, in fact. I'm guessing her endorsement of Harris could coalesce a bloc of young females from Allentown to Harrisburg and maybe push Pennsylvania and its critical 19 electoral votes toward Harris.

We'll just have to wait and see.

 

 

Pet grief

Kim and I have entered into a strange, colorless and empty land where we are grieving for the passing of our cat, Halo.

It's been nearly two weeks since we made the decision to put her down. She was suffering from arthritis, 100 percent renal failure and quite possibly lymphoma, which probably accounted for her drastic weight loss in her final months. There was no coming back from this. 

Halo

It's not as if this kind of grief is anything new for us. In our nearly 44 years of marriage, we've had cats in the house for about 41 of those years. Five cats over that span, actually. And now we've buried all five.

But the grief we feel for Halo is somehow subtly different for us than it was for the others. We made the deliberate decision that we will no longer have any more pets. I am 73 years old and Kim is 64, and we just don't want any future pets to outlive us.

I asked Kim if she was feeling the difference in grief we felt for our other cats in the same way I was, and she said yes. We tried to put our finger on it.

The grief we have for Halo seems sharper – harder – because we know there will be no more pets in the house. There's a finality in that.

There are times when I feel a sense of guilt because my grief for Halo – as well as for our previous cats – sometimes seems to transcend the grief I've felt for some humans, even family members. I've talked with a few other pet owners about this phenomenon and they pointed out that we are with our pets nearly every day. We are their daily caregivers, almost from their birth to their death. If you do have any emotional ties to your pet, it's almost inherently impossible to divorce yourself from them.

Having a pet is both a total commitment and an unspoken promise. You do that because in return you receive an unfettered loyalty and – dare I say it? – an unconditional love.

And as Kim pointed out, Halo was a solo cat. At no time in her nine years with us was there another cat in the house. Maybe that's what made her seem different to us. She was her own cat. She was independent, as cats are, but she also needed us as her stewards, as pets do. I call it independent dependency.

So now Kim and I are in that colorless, empty land where the urge to get another cat is starting to pull on us.

I kind of knew this could happen. A day after Halo passed, I collected everything in the house that belonged to a cat – scratching posts, litter boxes, toys, food, medicine, anything – and donated them to a local cat rescue. I'm hoping that by giving that stuff away it reinforces our decision not to get another pet. It's removed a lot of the household triggers to our grief.

We do have one reminder. We've kept an old cloth basket that at some point all of our cats have curled up in. That stays. For some reason, there is no hurt in that basket.

There are neighborhood cats around, so it's not as if we can't get our cat fix.

And I can sense with each day that passes, the grief is diminishing. I guess that's healthy. I don't think we'll require counseling.

As with anything that passes, we have our memories. We know we kept our promises to Halo. That will be enough. 

Halo wants her chair back.

 

 

Halo

Ragdoll cats are supposed to be one of the more docile feline breeds around. They are named Ragdoll, in part, because of the way they go limp in your arms when you pick them up. Limp like a child's ragdoll.

And that's what we were looking for when we got Halo.

We'd had a Ragdoll before. Years ago, Dolittle gave us infinite hours of love, joy and amusement. When Dolittle was a kitten, she actually jumped up on the bed and slept on the top of Kim's head. Repeatedly. That's what Ragdolls do.

So when Dolittle died, we debated whether or not we wanted another cat. It wasn't a decision we made lightly. I was already 64 years old – Kim was 55 – and we were pretty sure we didn't want any future pets to outlive us. But we took a chance and picked up Halo from the same Ragdoll cattery in Salisbury where we got Dolittle.

She was extremely cute, as kittens are. She was a Blue Mitted Ragdoll and she had those signature blue eyes, but she also had a white blaze on her forehead and nose. That was all it took and we brought her home.

We even named her Halo, not only because she looked kind of cherubic, but we also looked forward to her angelic Ragdoll personality to kick in.

And we waited. And waited. And waited.

Turns out, Halo never read the Ragdoll manual. While most Ragdolls by trait are laid back, apparently about 10 percent or so are not. They exhibit contrary or antisocial behavior.

Lucky us. We got the 10 percent.

Halo was OK with us, but probably moreso with me than with Kim. Since I was retired, I was the one who was home most of the time. She'd follow me around the house, let me stroke her cotton-like fur, fuss when she needed her litter box cleaned. Kim was just a visitor who showed up to put kibbles in the food dish and tell her how pretty she was.

In truth, she was tolerant of Kim, often times swiping at her feet or complaining when Kim would pick her up to hold her. We actually timed Halo – you could hold her for exactly 30 seconds before she would squirm to be put back down on the floor. She would not sit on your lap or by your side. If she hopped on the bed, she slept by your feet, not on your head.

She would squaw at visitors. She would show them her claws as if they were switchblades. She would tell them where to go. She was, as Kim said, opinionated.

And yet...

As the years passed, we grew accustomed to her behavior, taking solace in the fact that nobody else likely would put up with her, and that she was lucky to have a home with us.

But a few months ago, she was diagnosed with arthritis even though she was just nine years old. She started peeing outside the litter box because it was difficult for her to step in. Visits to the veterinarian temporarily alleviated some of her issues, but they weren't going to go away. She would require more visits.

Today her bloodwork revealed 100 percent renal failure and her dramatic weight loss – from 15 pounds to just 6 in a matter of months – suggested possible lymphoma as well. Even her vet, Dr. Salli Steward – who last saw Halo in May – was taken aback by her rapid slide. There was no turning back.

So we made the difficult decision that nearly every responsible pet owner makes sooner or later, because, you know, nothing lasts forever.

Dr. Steward hooked up the IV catheterization port. We laid her down and I put the palm of my hand over Halo's head – over her blaze – which she always liked. It was her safe spot and I could always feel her pushing back in appreciation, just as she did this one last time. Then Dr. Steward introduced the Euthasol and Halo peacefully slipped into another dimension.

Halo was lucky to have us?

She was feisty. She was loyal. She was beautiful. We were lucky to have Halo.

 

What's with these guys?

Do Republicans have any decency at all?

I can understand political attacks directed at an opponent to make him look weak, uninformed and not part of the main stream, but geez, when you go after the neurodivergent child of a candidate, well, that gets pretty low.

That's what happened the other night when vice presidential candidate Tim Walz was speaking about his family during the acceptance speech at the Democracic National Convention. Walz's 17-year-old son, Gus, erupted into tears of joy and the national TV audience saw him point to his father on the stage while mouthing the words, "That's my dad!"

Most viewers saw Gus's display of love and tears as endearing.

But not all.

"Now that's weird," posted conservative columnist and lightening rod Ann Coulter on Elon Musk's social platform X almost as soon as Walz was done leaping for joy. And, apparently, she wasn't the only one.

Souless.

It seems that conservative males become emasculated when they shed tears of joy (or pain, or grief, or heartache), according to recent Republican canon for manhood.

Coulter took down her post when she learned that Gus had learning disabilities, but not without claiming – and I paraphrase here – "well, the Democrats called Republicans weird first." Which totally misses the point in addition to sounding childish.

This episode reminds me of the time when convicted felon Donald Trump, who is the Republican candidate for president and is seeking a second term, mocked severely disabled New York Times journalist Serge Kovaleski, who suffers from a congenital joint condition.

That was during Trump's first campaign back in 2015, but it apparently opened the doors for sheer, thoughtless meaness to sweep across the country. We see the results to this day. If a presidential candidate can do that, why can't the rest of us?

In a similar but different vein, Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan accused the Dems of stealing Republican values during their convention this past week. Values like faith and patriotism.

Say what?

I generally respect Noonan's opinion on most things, but she missed the boat on this. Those aren't Republican values. They're American values. As David Corn, the Washington DC bureau chief for Mother Jones responded, "Stole? No one has an exclusive claim to patriotism." 

C'mon, Peggy. Be better than that.

C'mon, Republicans. Be better than that.

All of us need to be better than that.

Are you better off?

Every now and then, when I'm perusing Facebook these days, somebody inevitably posts – usually a Republican – President Ronald Reagan's now-famous question to voters: "Are you better off now than you were four years ago?"

The question has become nearly iconic during every election season. It doesn't matter who's running for office, or which party they represent. It's a many-faceted question that almost always demands a response. It's a dig, it's accusatory, it's penetrating, it's superficial, it can be rhetorical and it can be literal at the same time. It's not avoidable.

I've thought about this a little bit. My own question is why are some people asking this now?

But let's take a look.

Four years ago was August 2020. The now-34-time convicted felon and adjudicated rapist Donald Trump was the president and he was running for a second term. And he was drowning in Covid-19, which, by that point, had claimed the lives of at least 350,000 Americans in a pandemic he totally mishandled. He asked if we could maybe inject bleach. And some people did. Thank you, Dr. Trump.

I think there's been a collective amnesia that has conveniently (for Trump, at least) blocked out the temporary morgues that sprang up, complete with refrigeration trucks, outside of hospitals as people died on their ventilators. Well, if they could get a ventilator in the first place. It was real carnage, not the kind you make up for an inauguration speech.

To his credit, Trump did bring us Operation Warp Speed, which gave us a Covid vaccination when we needed it most, and in record time. But then, paradoxically, he downplayed the vaccination, creating anti-vaxxers and anti-maskers. People died, predominantly cultist Trump Republicans. Trump even came down with Covid himself and required life-saving efforts from a medical team at Walter Reed Hospital.

So there's that. Covid. It set the stage for what would follow. The unemployment rate rose to 15 percent. The supply chain was in its initial stages of breakdown. Inflation was low, 1.9 percent or something like that early on, but the worldwide pandemic would jack that up to nearly 10 percent by the time Joe Biden took office.

The economy was strong under Trump (which he inherited from President Obama), but then Covid came on big time in March of that year and suddenly, both the job and stock markets cratered. Guess who stood by and played golf? Thank you, Prof. Trump.

All of this chaos was handed over to Biden, who had exactly one day – his Inauguration – to enjoy as his honeymoon period. But working with a severely divided Congress, Biden has created more jobs – about 15 million – than any one-term president. The inflation rate has dropped to 2.9 percent as wages rise.  The unemployment rate has fallen to about 4 percent. A couple weeks ago some high-profile hostages were released from Russia, and this week, the administration announced it has renegotiated lowering prescription drug prices with Big Pharma. I'll be able to afford my Eliquis in a year. Border crossings are so low that Texas Governor Greg Abbott doesn't have any illegals to ship off to Northern sanctuary cities anymore. 

Crime is down. Well, except for Trump crime. Why is this guy still the Republican candidate?

My 401k has never been better. Has yours?

So the next time somebody asks if I'm better off than I was four years ago, the answer is a resounding Hell yeah! Vote blue.