Friday, December 27, 2019

Gleaning FaceBook: Shaw Gathering at Mother's

The Shaw Christmas get-together at Rollingwood on December 26 was small by our standards: only 3 of The Seven, only 3 of The Spouses, only 3 of 18 Grands, and only 4 of 35 Great Grands. But a good time was had by all. It was so good to see all four of David & Vicki's grandkids. What a cute bunch of kids.

L-R: Andrew Lewis, Deborah Shaw Lewis, Lisette Lewis, Ruth Baird Shaw, Sheila Matthews Shaw, Terrell Shaw, Lillian Shaw, Gregg Lewis, Vicki, Micah, Darcy, Mia, David, Alex


Comments

Annie Scarbrough Great to see all of you that were together.

Claudia Kennedy Such a beautiful family!
Angela Greear
Good lookin' bunch

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Anita Stewart A great bunch of folks!

Gleaning Facebook: Baby Shark!

Residing a continent away from our beloved grandchildren requires ingenuity in gift-giving. For Clementine's first birthday last April we produced a picture book for her called Who Loves Clementine? It was a great success and reminds her of her East Coast family every time she looks at it.

For Christmas we have been working on an amateur video for Clemmie & Ruth (well, really for Clemmie now and Ruthie eventually) Clementine is fascinated with a certain baby carnivorous cartilaginous fish*. She asks the silly song about said fish to be played every time she is strapped into her carseat. She has watched a video version of it likely hundreds of times. So we produced --- well, Lillian produced --- an absolutely ridiculous iPhone video version of the song starring Granny, Grandshaw, and Aunt Lil with her ukulele. I cannot tell you how much fun we have had creating this two-minute bit of insanity! It ended up taking an extra day to complete, but what difference does that make to a one-year-old and a newborn? Lillian just sent the edited final product and Sheila and I have watched it about a dozen times in the last couple of hours.
(Later)
Now that our California family has seen it, I'll allow my Facebook friends to see how truly insane Grandshaw Terrell & Granny Sheila can be....
*trying to avoid copyright difficulties.


Angela Greear Love it

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Jessie Reed
It’s perfect 

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Patricia Buffington Jackson
I love it !! Great production!!
Rhonda Ingram Bramlette
This is the sweetest version of this song ever! And I have heard quite a few! You guys are amazing!

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Nancy Johal Singh That is so awesome!!! You guys are the best.
Julianne Lindholm Bailey
So cute!
Gary Sarah Pace
This is wonderful..........sjp

Ann Perkins Niemeier Very good one! I’m sure your granddaughters will love it!

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George Dean pastedGraphic_7.png


Anita Stewart Just too cute. Love the happy birthday message to Clementine. You should go into the "Birthday Video" business.
Bill Pelfrey Jr
Well done...
Andy Offutt Irwin
Y’all’re the coolest!!
Jeri Carter
Amazing! Our whole family got *very* familiar with the song during the window in which our grandson William was enamored of it--his generation's version of Barney, I guess....
Charity Gilchrist Nicholson
That is just about the cutest thing I've seen in a long time! Good job Lil, Grandshaw, and Granny!
Leslie Rainey Shelley
I have also been a long distance FaceTime YaYa and have participated in very similar activities! Love your video and I am sure your sweet girls have too! Merry Christmas!
Sunny Shropshire Knauss
Y’all are so awesomely talented! Saweeet!
Kathy Vogler Steinbruegge
That is fantastic! You are such a creative family! I would love to see Clementine watching it!
Elizabeth Davis
I can’t stand that song, but this video is so precious and creative!!

Terrell Shaw We spent two weeks in November with Clemmie and heard it about 351,002,675 times. We'd hate it too except... our grandbaby LOVES it!
Elizabeth Davis
I often think about Pensacola, FL when I hear “Baby Shark” now because my friend Lyndell and I had a long conversation about that song when we were down there in July.
Kiela Burton Beam
Love it!!! So much fun.
Julie Merritt Clonts
So cute!!
Deb Fincher
I love it. Fantastic job guys.
Ellice Curry-Tucker
Just the sweetest!!
Katie S. Kimbrough
Very sweet video! I’m sure the girls will enjoy it!
Teresa Humphrey
Simply Awesome!
Stacie Scoggins Marshall
Love this!
Linda Hatcher
That is great!
Cathy McEver Tomlinson
That is awesome!!! love it!
Bonny Askew
Love it.
Wendell W Barnes Jr
You guys are nuts! Loved it!

Robin Holt I love, love, love this!!!

Holly Kastanias Cothran This is perfect!
Jill Sealy Salter
I love this!!!
John Collette
Awesome!
Morgan Askew-Samuels
This is so darn cute!!!!
Susan Barnes Babb
Love this!!
Emily Barksdale Moore Threlkeld
Amazingly, wonderfully, fabulously, WONDERFUL! Love it!
Debbie Reece Grigsby
Good job!
Della Green
I love it !!!!
Donald Murdock
Most excellent!
Sandra Aguirre-MagaƱa What blessed granddaughters you have! Thoroughly enjoyed this!
Peggy Fowler-Casillas
This is the cutest thing ever. 

Trinie Free Davis I LOVE this!!!!
Marcia Jackson Abernathy
I just love this! Thanks for sharing 

Katy Joy Croft Omg!!! I love this so much! My son Kingston is obsessed with baby shark. He’s going to get a great laugh at this when he wakes up from his nap and I show it to him.

Ann Allee McRay Too cute!!!
Charlene Payne
Grandparents will do anything for their grands!!!! The girls will love it and cherish it.


Sandy Ingram We do all sorts of crazy things for our grandchildren but this might just top them all  Good job


Ann Gore This video is precious! What we will do for our grands!!
Renata Carlin Very cute!
Barbara Crawford
OMG hysterically perfect. Love it! 

Charity Gilchrist Nicholson Still one of the best videos I've ever seen!

Deborah Lake Dawson So sweet!
Julianne Reeves
I absolutely love this! You guys are so creative!


Chris Ann Buff Loved this!!

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2020

Susan Myers Smith Love it!
Howard Smith So cute! We have been "fortunate" to have heard this song maybe a million times now! And it is why I am presently called Grandpa!
Margo Ash
THIS is wonderful! 

Jennifer Penick Beason Super cute.
Angela Greear
Love it

Gola Burton Cute!! We had to change the scout version because swimmer dude lost a leg.
Ralph Davis
Love you Guys 

Lynne Crothers Williams Great idea.

Trude Sansbury You guys are great!

Melanie Collette Babb Love it. I like that Sheila is called Granny. My grands call me Granny too.

Steven Savage Very entertaining. That shark is frightening


Southern Timber

One morning in the mid seventies I woke to the radio, and yawned. I was nestled in bed in the great room of our little log cabin home on Lake Creek near the southern border of Floyd County Georgia in the little rural community known as Chubbtown. The radio droned on as I made a pot of coffee and began my morning routine. My ears pricked up at the mention of the West Georgia Tollway. Jimmy Carter, our governor, had killed the tollway! That's when I told Sheila that, however Quixotic Carter's presidential campaign seemed, he had my support.
Georgia transportation officials and many leaders in West Georgia had made plans for a route to connect Chatatnooga and Tallahassee via a new multi-lane toll road roughly following US 27 down the west side of the state. If the plans were not changed the highway would tear out the hills and woods on the west bank of Lake Creek within sight of our little cabin. Tree-huggers like me were adamantly opposed. Why not improve US 27 without ripping up a swath of earth the length of the state for a new route?
Jimmy Carter turned out to be a wily and pretty ruthless politician. He and folks like the young Jody Powell and Ham Jordan plotted a campaign tailor made for the new realities of the post-McGovern, post Vietnam, post-Watergate world. He promised not to lie to us. Sounds pretty basic, but that was an important pledge in 1975-76. His southern accent and official use of an informal nickname drove the Democratic establishment nuts, but he prevailed.
Then an amazing thing happened. The wily, ruthless Jimmy Carter took his oath so seriously that he left politics almost entirely to others and made his decisions based purely on his conception of the nation's good. Of his failings this was his greatest. His conception of the nation's good did not factor in the harm that losing to a Reagan would do.

Still Jimmy Carter was a much better president than he is given credit for:
  • He made important gains toward mideast peace through intense and stubborn personal diplomacy.
  • He led us through the necessary return of the Panama Canal to the people of Panama.
  • He upgraded our military despite the political costs and the lies to the contrary; later presidents owe a great debt to Carter for the greatest military in history.
  • Carter led an ethical and honest administration.
  • He was willing to risk his presidency to rescue our hostages in Iran. He knew the odds, just as Obama did in the case of the Bin Laden raid; Both were brave, but Obama was lucky and Carter (and those heroes in the desert) were not. 
  • He appointed Paul Volker to the fed to stop the economic disaster that resulted from Nixonian policies. Conservatives love to blast him despite his careful and important deregulation where it was safe and economy-boosting to do so. 
  • Oh, and he started no wars.
Jimmy Carter was indeed a ruthless and effective politician in his quest for the presidency, but from the moment he recited that Constitutional pledge on January 20, 1977 until that sleepless night and heartbreaking morning of January 20, 1981, I challenge anyone to find a moment when he put his own politics above the good of his country.

My endorsement of Carter in 1976...

More than a decade ago we got to attend Carter's Sunday School class at Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains, GA...


Thursday, December 26, 2019

I am a republican. Republicans, nowadays, mostly aren't.

When voters elect members of the group that has become the base of the Georgia (and national) Republican Party they are electing folks who hate government (We the People), who think all politicians are crooked, who expect deceit and graft in government (We the People). And their expectations are realized, often by their own behaviors.  I believe Capital-R Republicans are much less likely to respect ALL the people. They are more likely to disrespect the wisdom of ordinary folk, especially lower income, lesser educated, minority, or immigrant Americans. Yes, the Democratic Party also has some lousy crooks, but it is far from an even match-up. The GOP (Greedy Ol' Party) have a much higher incidence of crookedness. 

Small-r republicanism is hard; it is messy, it often fails; but give me "public servants" who believe that title is the ideal, who really believe government is, in fact, "We the People", and thereby should always be of, by, and for the people.

We have watched as our public schools in Georgia have suffered for two decades under the rule of legislators who do not believe in public education. Is it any wonder that when those who do not respect government (We the People) run it they are more apt to expect corruption and even excuse it in themselves? After all they are convinced: "Everyone does it."

It goes back to the Goldwater-Bircher crowd in the late fifties and sixties, and came to power with the Reagan crowd in the eighties, grew truly obnoxious under the Atwater-Manafort-Gingrich-Bush crowd into the nineties and 2000s, and defaulted to pure evil as the Tea Party/Trump/Putin coalition maneuvered to power in 2017.

Again we Democrats have had our share of sleaze; I contend the Republicans in the era of Donald John Trump have much more than their fair share of sleaze. 

I am a republican. I recognize that we must be vigilant. A republic by definition is run by fallible humans: the public. But we must expect and demand that we hold our public servants to the ideals stated so eloquently in the Preamble. Messy and flawed though our republic quite naturally is, I still hold these truths to be self-evident, that all are created equal and endowed with unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And that to secure those rights (legitimate) governments are instituted.

I am a republican. But, in my opinion, Republicans, nowadays, mostly aren't.

Sunday, December 22, 2019

Gleaning Facebook: Caroling & City Clocks

 Having lunch at Trinity before we head out for rainy day caroling! Come join us. Joy to the world!

Later: I was delighted to see these two City Clock items in one of the homes where we sang carols today.


City Clock birdhouse

The signature seems to be "F. Moses."

Saturday, December 21, 2019

Gleaning Facebook: Live Nativity 2019

Taking my once-a-year opportunity to be a wise man instead of a wise guy again tonight. I first stood in the Trinity nativity scene at Christmas in 1962. With only a few exceptions it has been an annual tradition.

Michael J. Burton

Mostly remember the heated bricks for frozen feet and the wonderful hot chocolate afterwards.


Leigh Whittenburg Callan
Michael J. Burton
Me too!

Terrell Shaw
I was there on the coldest Christmas Eve in the history of Rome GA. We went 15 minute shifts.

Michael J. Burton
Terrell Shaw
year?
Leigh Whittenburg Callan --
 

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Terrell Shaw
Michael J. Burton It was the year Frank Craven’s son was born. Frank and Sharon stood as Joseph and Mary the last shift I think... stayed with us to help clean up and put the animals up. Seems like it got to about -2 F that night. We said Merry Christmas and Good Night about 9:30... Sharon delivered a little boy not long after midnight! Mid-eighties maybe?


Michael J. Burton
Terrell Shaw
I had some cold nights but not in the 1980s


Freddie Ashley
Probably the thing about miss most about Christmas in Rome!


George Barton
I was in the first year, also a wise man when A. J. Peters was minister, Daughter Joyce still goes to Trinity? She would remember the year.


Michael J. Burton
George Barton
hadn’t seen Joyce in 60 years


Paula Dickinson
Trinity’s Nativity has certainly been a great tradition for my family.

Some Evangelicals

I wrote the paragraphs below several months ago. I kinda forgot about the post. Then yesterday Mark Galli, the editor-in-chief of Christianity Today, nudged my memory. 
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Among the saddest moments of my life have been those times of realization that one I admire, or even love, is not who I thought him/her to be. The nomination of Donald John Trump by the party of Lincoln and the resulting campaign and then the coup of 2016 and his illegitimate reign as president of our former republic uncovered some very dark recesses in our society and, lo and behold, there were some folks I never expected to see in a sewer. Because so many of those were members of the evangelical community —the community that raised me — I was devastated and horribly disappointed. It seemed for a while that virtually all evangelicals had drunk the fetid Kool-Aid.

Recently I returned to the very small village where I attended an evangelical college from 1965 to 1969, for the fiftieth reunion of my graduating class. I almost dreaded it, figuring I would find few kindred spirits.
I am thrilled to report to you that among the serious evangelicals in my class and on that campus are, perhaps a minority but, sizable numbers of folks who oppose the evil of Trump as adamantly as I, if somewhat more quietly.
Even in the sixties my college was largely Republican. When during a trivia time at the reunion that weekend the "Young Republicans’ campaign for Nixon in ‘68" was the answer to a question, I had to interrupt and stand to remind the gathered throng that our YD group may have been small but we were enthusiastic in that campaign too. We opened a HQ in that tiny town. We ventured to larger cities in the region to campaign for RFK and later HHH. I personally met RFK and HHH and Katie Peden (running for Senate) and heard Muskie.
Afterwards a classmate quietly came across the room to thank me and to talk of the struggle of those of us who cannot imagine reconciling belief in a God of Love with support for the evil of the Rapist-In-Chief’s campaign and his cruel and ruinous presidency. She was far from the only one. Those holding true to their beliefs to oppose Trump included some (even a YR leader) who adamantly opposed my political choices fifty years ago. 


So, my friends, when you speak of evangelical involvement in the graft and perversion and lies and cruelty of the Great Grabber, please remember to modify the term “evangelical”. It is certainly more than “some", OK, still “most”, but it is not “all”. 
---
Later Note: The President and CEO of Christianity Today wrote about the responses to the Mark Galli article. Those responses included some that resonated with my own discovery of like-minded evangelicals at my college reunion:

"... We have received countless notes of encouragement from readers who were profoundly moved. They no longer feel alone. They have hope again. Many have told us of reading the editorial with tears in their eyes, sharing it with children who have wandered from the faith, rejoicing that at last someone was articulating what they felt in their hearts. They felt this was a watershed moment in the history of the American church—or they hoped it would prove to be. Stay strong, they told us, knowing we were about to reap the whirlwind..."

Friday, December 20, 2019

"Commencing Demagogues, Ending Tyrants"

I managed to read the Bible cover to cover this late summer and fall. I am ashamed to admit that ---though I have managed to pass college classes on "The New Testament," "Basic Cristian Beliefs," and "The Teachings of Jesus", and though I have listened to hundreds of Christian sermons as a Methodist preacher's kid and as a student at a holiness college that required attendance at three weekly chapel services, and though I attended years of Sunday School and weeks of Vacation Bible School --- I had never before read the Bible straight through. My mother praises Peterson's translation called "The Message" as an accurate translation in language very accessible to modern English speakers, so that is the version I read. It was sometimes startling to hear the "message" of the Bible expressed through modern idiom, but I found it very understandable. 

Recently I had reason to look up one of the Federalist Papers to try to understand Hamilton's explanation and arguments about a section of the Constitution. I found the essay very difficult to understand. Perhaps it was my pleasure at having the Bible in accessible language that made me wonder if there were a "Message" version of the Federalist Papers. Turns out there is more than one. I found this one in pdf form online and compared a few paragraphs with the original and decided it seemed a helpful "translation" even though it was produced by a libertarian group.

The Federalist Papers are important to the understanding of the Constitution. They make clear the motivation of Hamilton, Madison, and Jay as they promoted huge changes in American government. Fully understood, they can clear up some common confusion and outright misinterpretation of the Constitution.

During the current presidential administration I have read many wrongheaded (IMO, of course) screeds about the Electoral College and the Second Amendment, in particular. 

Therefore I have been pleased to discover these "modern" Federalist Papers. Here is a passage from Federalist #1 and the same passage from the "modern" version.

“…the vigor of government is essential to the security of liberty; that, in the contemplation of a sound and well-informed judgment, their interest can never be separated; and that a dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the people than under the forbidden appearance of zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government. History will teach us that the former has been found a much more certain road to the introduction of despotism than the latter, and that of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people; commencing demagogues, and ending tyrants.”


Rewritten in more modern language:

“A healthy government is essential to secure liberty. A strong government and liberty can never be separated. Dangerous ambition is more often masked by a zeal for the rights of the people than the zeal for a firm and efficient government. History teaches us that most men who have overturned the liberties of republics began their career by proclaiming their devotion to the people. They gain position by arousing people’s prejudices and end as tyrants.”

This looks like an accurate rewording of the original to me.

So I'm gonna read 'em.

Thursday, December 19, 2019

Gleaning Facebook: Venting....

Several Facebook posts today...

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In my book the fact that this soulless comment from Trump is absolutely typical of his fecal behavior should be enough for Congress to say, "You sir are too despicable to continue your squatting in our executive mansion!" In my book it is a high crime to smear the office of George Washington et al with a pattern of behavior so excremental. Jackson, A. Johnson, Harding, Nixon, Clinton, and others have had moments of shameful behavior; Donald Trump is consistently, daily, unendingly, childishly, shameful. Enough!


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I suppose it was to be expected, but still it is depressingly disappointing that our Congressman, Tom Graves, could not bring himself to rise above petty politics and stand up for our Republic. President Trump betrayed his oath and betrayed America for his own political benefit. Now Tom Graves has done the same with his vote to excuse that betrayal.

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Saturday, December 14, 2019

Gleaning Facebook: Paradise Gardens

 Having a great time at Howard Finster's Paradise Garden this afternoon! Good music, refreshments, and a great tour guide -- Asa Cook, our neighbor and son of the Paradise Gardens Director.












Friday, December 13, 2019

Gleaning Facebook: Politics Today

Adam Schiff wonders what I have wondered many times as I have listened to friends and family, otherwise kind and intelligent people, defend the indefensible.


Comments

Alan Hoal
They will do what they do now, lie.

Jean Filson Linos
I will be able to say I protested, voted, phoned and such.

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And even Chris Wallace has come to the same realization many of us reached much earlier.


Tuesday, December 10, 2019

Gleaning Facebook: Like the 1770s American Must Choose Sides

 Today is a sad but important and inspiring day in American history. The Trump presidency is exactly the sort of emergency that the founders made plain demands impeachment. Today Democratic representatives in Congress came together, despite political obstacles and uncertainties, to do the right thing and propose two articles of impeachment.

We saw the embarrassing display of raging House (capital-R) Republicans siding with Donald John Trump despite the overwhelming evidence of blatant betrayal of his oath of office without offering a scintilla of refutation for the damning facts of his abuse of power and contempt of Congress. We also saw, yesterday and throughout this process courageous, principled ordinary American patriots speaking truth to power.
Today we heard two articles of impeachment proposed. I believe there could have been many more, but these two should be obvious to any reasonably fair-minded American:

1. Donald John Trump has abused his power, beginning during the transition, through the inauguration, and continuing to this moment -- all to benefit himself without regard to his oath or the good of the nation.
2.Donald John Trump has blatantly and publicly been in contempt of Congress's oversight duties by continuously obstructing their Constitution responsibilities to investigate his criminal behavior.
We have had instances of presidential misbehavior in the past. NO other president has so consistently behaved so contrary to his oath. If THIS behavior cannot bring about impeachment then the American president is no longer subject to the law and America is no longer a Republic.
It is time now for Americans to choose sides again, as they had to do in the 1770s.
We each must choose whether we will be patriots or royalists?
Are we a (small-r) republicans or monarchists?
It appears that, in 2019, many Republicans are NOT republicans.


Friday, December 06, 2019

Gleaning Facebook: Saying Goodbye




On the way to SAN on Tuesday we stopped at an In-N-Out near the airport for a quick lunch before our flight. John or Brannon took this picture of Sheila and me with our two granddaughters, Ruth sleeping in her car-seat and Clemmie beaming a ketchup coated smile. How hard it was to leave these two little blessings and their beloved parents on the far coast! We'll be back in April.

Monday, December 02, 2019

Gleaning Facebook: Walking Into the Past


During one of my morning walks this week through Rancho Guajome Abobe Park in Vista, California, I noticed this rock and suspected it was a grinding stone used by pre-Columbian residents. I found a park employee who confirmed it. I am surprised there is no signage for it, but perhaps they worry about vandals. Renata Carlin tells me there are many similar sites in the area, including the namesake site of Indian Rock Road that I walked this morning. A fence kept me from getting a picture of that one.