Real, S1E6

This time I managed to key in the post title without attempting to use capital numbers. It's a good way to start the day and I've got to take my wins -- however small and silly -- whenever I manage to eke them out.

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What's my mission here at the Prairie Adventure/Naval AirCowman Blog? Is it to support and defend the Constitution of the United States? Is it to extend the hand of friendship to all of my fellow ape-lizard Earthlings? Is it to help me learn how to think and express important ideas? Is it to share imprecise memories which nevertheless might be somehow useful to others? Perhaps all of those things and more. Perhaps none of those things and less. I'm afraid it's mostly flailing, usually with good intentions, but not always.

Since last we met...

On Tuesday the seventh Mom and I went to Sidney to fetch chicken feed and grab a freedom burger. She had a Lil' Mac meal and I had a double quarter pounder with cheese. Oh baby that was a tasty burger.

People were still alive in Sidney. Lots of people. In fact, all of them were alive. Just like Kimball. Weird. And there were cars, pickups, and trucks on the interstate. As far as I could tell they were all piloted by living ape-lizards.



I walked by an in-town operating oil well.



I was nearly defeated by a simple task.



On Wednesday the eighth Nona and I went to the garage to have a tire remounted.



I turned fence post scouting into a jolly good hike.



Couldn't explain without babbling though...



On Thursday the ninth I got hammered with pop-up tasking. The Big Aircrew Chief pointed me at people I really wanted nothing to do with and said, "do or do not, ball's in your court." I did. It took me well outside my comfort zone. I have no way of knowing ultimate outcomes, and it's really none of my business. I was blessed. Thursday was a day overflowing with tough work and boundless reward.

Friday was filled with chores and details.



And proof of concept tasks.



Yesterday (Saturday) was warm and filled with labor and delight.



And the day after yesterday? How about a report from Herefordshire?



Farming...

Gardening.

Meanwhile back at the ranch, it was April in Nebraska!





How about a pre-Easter Dinner hike?



Fire and ice?



The blessing is doing, not the difficulty of doing.



Red flushed a sharp tailed grouse from her snug shelter. Nature.

More doing.



Some trails are snow covered. Some are not.



My faith tells me that God will illuminate every possible path. If only I ask, and if only I do my part.





Easter egg salad.

Ham.

Plate.

Blessed.

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As I write this it's Easter Sunday. April 12, 2020, and it's a good day to think about survival skills.

I can do the physical and cognitive survival stuff pretty well for an old man. Those are fantastic skills to have, and being able to execute -- and knowing I am able to execute -- hard physical and mental challenges, well, that's a very fine thing. Those are components of a generally functional ape-lizard.

The most important survival skill, at least for me, is the spiritual one. No use being a clever hut builder if I'm dead and empty in the core and my existence is a hollow facade built upon rotted and shifting detritus.

Corporeal survival alone is a Hobbesian nightmare, "Solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." Hobbes argued that to survive, ape-lizards require corporeal sovereigns wielding the sword of justice to keep everyone in line.

I think the evidence shows that every ape-lizard is well equipped with monumental egocentrism. It looks to me like we are all perfectly selfish, nasty, and brutish. I know I am. I also know that no team of corporeal sovereigns can keep me in check. I look around and see that this fact is, as best I can tell, universal. We ape-lizards are many, and the corporeal sovereigns and their agents are few. The fatal flaw of this scheme is that the corporeal sovereigns and their agents are themselves selfish, nasty, and brutish. They are ape-lizards after all.

In a miraculous way though, the Hobbesian scheme actually works. When ape-lizards kneel to God and do their best to walk a path of love and service and brotherhood, unimaginably good things happen. When I look around I see proof of this on display at every turn. My non-corporeal and universal Sovereign allows my life to be spectacular and gives me the power to bring my good characteristics to the fore. As it turns out, I am also made with empathy and kindness and understanding and caring and love.

Astonishingly, it is always my choice. I can take the solitary ape-lizard path, or the harder but infinitely better path illuminated by my non-corporeal Sovereign. I do not know why this is so, only that it is.

When I walk the illuminated path I am transformed. I can and do veer from the path. I run off the road all the time. But it never stops shining brightly, and when I am on my Sovereign's highway I know I am where I am supposed to be.

The life-path is always hard. The hills are always steep and the footing treacherous. Always. Yesterday, today, tomorrow.

Every hill is surmountable. Sometimes the path to the summit is astonishing and unanticipated. A very cool thing, that.

The summit is always within reach, and the reward is always better than it could possibly be.

The physical reward is grand.

The spiritual reward is indescribably wonderful.

The phrase Heaven on Earth comes to mind.

Be well and embrace the blessings of liberty.