Day: February 22, 2023

You Tell Them Jimmy

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I saw this quote from President Jimmy Carter pop up on Facebook and decided to use it for my quote of the day:

“There were some people who didn’t like my being deeply involved with Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan and disreputable rock ‘n’ rollers. I didn’t care about that because I was doing what I really believed.”
~ Jimmy Carter
Then I went to see where it came from and I LOVED the story behind it:

“When Willie Nelson wrote his autobiography, he confessed that he smoked pot in the White House, one night, when he was spending the night with me,” says the former president in the film, which is directed by Mary Wharton.

“He said that his companion, that shared the pot with him, was one of the servants at the White House. That was not exactly true. It actually was one of my sons, which he didn’t want to categorize as a pot-smoker like him.

There were some people who didn’t like my being deeply involved with Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan and disreputable rock ‘n’ rollers. I didn’t care about that because I was doing what I really believed and the response from the followers of those musicians was much more influential than a few people who thought that being associated with rock ‘n’ roll and radical people was inappropriate in a president.”

 From the documentary: Jimmy Carter: Rock & Roll President

They Left Her There

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Untitled
Hyun Chung 2002

After I get off the train, I have to cross the railroad tracks to get to my Jeep.

The crossing itself isn’t bad, the pavement is smooth and the rails are almost flush with the ground so it’s not like you have to step up to avoid them. When it snows and it gets icy it’s a little sketchy because they don’t sand or de ice the pavement  and if you’re not careful you could slip and get hurt.

Yesterday I was crossing the tracks with about a half dozen other people when a lady in a wheel chair got stuck on one of the rails.

Two people were walking ahead of her

The lady’s wheel chair wasn’t a  motorized wheel chair, in fact it was bare bones and well used. Somehow her front wheel, which is a small wheel, got turned sideways and she got caught.

Just before I got to her, you could hear the next train blow it’s whistle which meant that in a few minutes the crossing arms where going to come down.

You would THINK that the people who were around her would have given her a little push to help her, but they did not.

I watched four  Puyallup’s  big strong men walk  around her and leave  stuck on the tracks, clearly struggling with her chair with a  train coming.

I could see that she was starting to panic and just as I got to her to give her a little boost she backed up and got herself out of the rut and we crossed the rest of the

way together.

On other days sometimes we chat a little when I’m waiting for the train but yesterday  as we crossed together she  didn’t ask me how my dog was. She also said

she got  worried because she knew the  train was coming, not because of the whistle but she could feel the ground vibrate and she knew it was coming in fast.

When we got to the other side, three of the men who walked around her felt obligated to say something as they waited to cross the street-  ” Oh were you stuck? “

I wanted to say something grand and bitchy, but the lady in the chair raised up her hand and gave him the finger.

For a moment there it felt like those four men who left he stuck on the tracks had hit the delete key on the Universe and the lady in the chair disappeared.

But she didn’t.

Yesterday she became one of my un-deletable  heroes.

RDP Wednesday: DELETE