Well Mr. Michael, always a pleasure to ride the rails with you.
"reflected on how in the heck did I get here ";  it was meant to be, and
you know it!
Looking forward to your next visit to the Elm City.  I can show you my
Great-Grandfather's Union pistol and uniform and another
Great-Grandfather's Confederate Uniform and swords!  Thank heaven for
the mutt.
Best,
Leland

-----Original Message-----
From: "Let us not speak foul in folly!" - ]<en Phollit
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
[log in to unmask]
Sent: Sunday, February 09, 2003 3:22 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Two Flags


I have been "away" with no lap top.see you next week
Pyrate


Two Flags

The light was an old light; golden in tinsel chandeliers up above
harbor Hotel  reception room with  red carpets washed thin and stained
with a generation of Budwiser and a millennium of hot Southern nights. A
dirty  mirrored  Loretta Young stairway  tumbles into  the room
suggesting that once soriety queens in buffonts danced to Elvis and
Gladys Knight" here.

Now the same colored waiters in white service coats  hustle drinks to
old retired warriors;ribboned and corpulent perhaps wishing they could
hear the Soul music of happier  times once more as they make small talk
with  hawk nosed  accountants and car salesmen with buckled cell phones
who snap their gum and grin widely. .Like  dusky shadows the waiters
move  among the crowd with iced burbons on silver trays their  tight
collars making  beads of sweat  at their foreheads

A bevy of  ill kept red necks; and good ol boys  lounged guard at the
door; Their Sunday  clothes and bad haircutsd are  out of date ;  With
surly stares and white socks  they keep all but the initiated and
invited at bay like   curs over a  food  bowl.
I took a long tug on my bourbon and waited ; my boys were not with me .
I knew nobody in this room except one vague acquaintance and he wasn't
showing; well not yet anyway.

Suddenly;there was  a call to attention; and old and young rose about a
hundred in alll.

The standard bearers brought in two falgs.in ceremony and stood to face
the room . First; the American flag and  the pledge of allegiance; with
hand over heart was recited  with reverend cadence  like  the  fervent
allegiance of former and would be patriots.

Then as if I was in a a Leni Risenstall (sp) movie  ; in quick
succession Next followed  the furl of the  Confederate flag .....and a
spell bound pledge... to the honor of the Confederacy with equal
patriotism..
..This is riveting  performance is   hauntingly  demonstrated with
outstretched arm  rigid with the palm lifted open.... to heaven.
  .
It was moving, powerful; and scary all at once.
I can see how small egos can get caught up and feel empowered by such
ceremony. Blood oaths of fealty;and supposed  inner knowledge of sacred
inheritance of country and divine right by race can  rule mens hearts
just as much now as it did in Attila the Huns day. All I need now is for
the lights to go off and the sheets  parade in with their  torches and
Im outta here . It wasn't so ; but  the  drama continued

After the pledges; the flags were retired next to the Baptist Christian
flag;(which is the Protestant flag ) This gets me nervous ; but to many
its as natural as apple pie.  I was then half expecting a militant
recital of the Nicene creed; but pleasantly  that didn't happen either

This  is  it; I am  in the holly of hollies. The meeting of the sons of
the Confederacy in a creaking old Hotel out of the Southern 60's. I took
another  long tug  on my fresh bourbon and reflected on how in the heck
did I get here .

Ive been working graves and have uncovered a few corpses; one with a
doubloon in its mouth  another wearing a chasity belt. Last week I
uncovered a rib cage; thigh bone  and a ten Franc piece of the French
revolution.The coin now graces my neck as a lucky charm but tonight Im
not so sure.

The graves I was working lie near Confederate rest . Long white rows of
marble slab  in the hundreds just outside Mobile. It was  on  the
birthday of Robert E. Lee. and ran into another stone mason who works
the confederate  (and union) graves.  A great big ; shirt off your back
;good ol boy stonemason with a thick drawl,  who loves to hunt an fish ;
cut stone and talk story "bout da wa" and by the way could I come over
and meet their group Mon /night. I said yes as I was  listening to him
recite the exploits of the 5 generals of the confederacy who are buried
here.

Now for those of us who grew up with pictures of Lee and Washington on
the school room wall instead of Linclon Robert E Lee Day is now
celebrated as Dr.Martin Luther  King  day ; King whose real  birthday is
anther month;is by no means an "accident" ;  by
being put into    Lees birthday
thus making it ... a "federal holiday"
This political gerrymander is like letting the Protestants of Northern
Ireland march  the Orange in catholic neighborhoods. It does nothing to
help "race " in this country Another screw up to pit one group aginst
anoter

To the Sons ; whose kin lie in neat white rows by the hundreds; and most
never owned slaves ; bristle of any affront to their gallant memory or
to their  flag..The stars and bars  . I hate these food fights ; In the
end diversity will win ; but I  try and stay clear of them as nobody is
alive from these days to defend themselves. But there is power in Death;
just ask the groups who want reparations for slavery; or go to  Culloden
in Morray Scotland where the Scots lie in Clan mounds by the hundreds
under their own flag;; their children came to the American Antebellum
South  ..as for  me ; keep the bloody  flag ; I like the history

Meanwhile; back at ground zero
I was munching on some stale M&M's  from a paper doily and finding
courage in the bourbon when suddenly I  was introduced to the Sons ; as
" a friend of ours"  ( Haven't I heard that before...God father?)  My
stonemason friend welcomed me to the dias where I momentarily nervously
stared at the crowd trying to find words before someone in the crowd
could throw a rope  over a beam .  Fearing the worst;  I then gave  a
historical narrative how the southern side of my family fought and died
at Gettysburg and Vicksburg and that I was also directly related to
General Mcellan; the General of the Union Army before Grant and a
political opponent of Linclon. I shared some personal family stories
from that period, whether they were true or not I don't know but the
crwod ate it up; and afterwards away from the dias  admist  back
slapping and cigars I was asked to the "pig roast" and turkey shoot out
at our "camp" to which I politely deferred to my schedule; and Groucho's
famous quote:

That I never joined clubs that would have me  for a member. Pyrate Ps
The sons have about 40,000 members here (and abroad)

Michael  from a stonemasons journal

--
To terminate puerile preservation prattling among pals and the
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--
To terminate puerile preservation prattling among pals and the
uncoffee-ed, or to change your settings, go to:
<http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/bullamanka-pinheads.html>