Mary brought home Chinese order-out, using a gift card she received for Christmas. After finishing our meal, I cracked open a fortune cookie and read my ‘fortune,’ while crunching on the broken cookie-shell.

It reads: “Your ability for accomplishment will follow with success.” Not satisfied in either my appetite or for a better ‘fortune,’ I broke open a second cookie and proceeded to munch away.

It reads: “Your kind spirit will lead to many new friendships.” Though, I still was not satisfied, I refused to have a third.

I’m afraid two fortune cookies and two ambiguous fortunes are my limit.

It’s another Friday, and it’s another Facebook (FB) ban for me. This time I’m in social media detention for three-days, which means it’ll be a new year before I can login and post anything.

The last time I found myself banned from FB was last week and that came because of having been hacked. This time they accused me violating their community standards after I posted a photograph from 1968 where Adam and I can be seen washing each other’s back while in the tub.

Why my parents thought this was a picture worth taking, I don’t know. What I do know is that Adam is dead nearly eight-years and I’m not getting any younger and I want others to experience the ‘simpler days’ when we didn’t have social media fascist turning ‘innocent photo’s’ into brazen ‘child pornography.’

Meanwhile, I saw a post from a friend that showed a naked woman, her back severely arched downward and her ass jutting up in a very sexualized pose. It was a meme she shared — meaning coming from someplace else on FB — and it asked, “How would you hit it?”

As far as I know, it is still on her timeline and she hasn’t been banned, not that she should be. I’m simply referring to it because it shows the double-standard FB has imposed on its users.

Immediately, I launched a protest and jus’ like the last time this happened, I’m not expecting a reply as it isn’t only Friday, it is also a holiday. And while I’m disappointed with FB and it’s over-reaction, I’m not gonna let it get in the way of celebrating the upcoming new year.

So, with all this stated — have a safe and wonderful Happy New Year and I’ll catch you on the flip side of the holiday!

It’s really hard to watch our eldest dog coming to the end of her life. She has dementia and – even though she dances around for her food at dinnertime – she needs hand-feeding as she’s has for the most part forgotten how to eat out of her supper bowl. I know that someday, sooner than later, I’ll have to make that final decision and lay her to rest, but not today as I watch over her, sleeping peacefully and twitching from little dog dreams.

And while on the subject of our eldest dog, I’m certain the neighbor’s think I’m nuts as I told them that I think there’s an owlet living in one of their pine trees. This came about the other evening when they texted Mary to let her know there were a couple of owls in our tree.

This is why I don’t let our eldest dog, which happens to also be our tiniest dog outside at night. She is literally small than the rabbits that invade our grass after dark and it would be easy for a hawk or owl to swoop in and carry her off.

Anyway, once outside, I could see one of the owls, but not the other. I tried to get some photo’s of it but my camera refused to focus or to flash, so when it dropped from our tree and into the neighbor’s trees, I had nothing to show for my efforts.

The next night, I when took her outside to do her business, I heard the flapping of a large bird’s wings coming from my neighbor’s side of the fence, in the area of the pine trees. Since I don’t have a cellphone capable of texting, I ask Mary to let the neighbors know that I think they could have an owl, and owlet or even an owl’s nest in their trees.

Thus, this is why I believe they may think I’m nuts. Oh, and as for my camera’s failure — a lack of a battery will do it every time.

Knock, knock, knock…
The door opens to smiling faces:

“Have you found God?”
“Oh, no, is God missing?”
“No, no, I mean – have you found Jesus?”
“Oh, dear, is he missing, too?”

Uncle Adam was known as a jokester and at a young age, I thought his favorite ‘target’ was my younger brother and his namesake, Adam. After all. it was Uncle Adam, who persuaded my brother that eating his ‘toe jam,’ would make him grow up strong.

How and why it came up, I don’t know; what I do remember is Uncle Adam convincing my kid brother that Prince Albert lived in a red tobacco tin and needed releasing before he suffocated. It would be a few more years before I learned this tale came from a popular crank call.

***

“Hello, do you have Prince Albert (a tobacco brand) in a can?” the caller would ask.

“Yes, we do.”

“Go let him out before he suffocates!,” followed by a quick hanging up of the phone.

***

The following day, Uncle Adam said he was going down to the hardware store, which also double as a sporting good store and a ‘five and dime’ department store. Adam and I begged Uncle to let us go with him, which he said yes too.

As Uncle Adam did his business, I wandered through the aisles, daydreaming about what I’d buy if I had a bunch of money. Finally, finished at the register, Uncle Adam called for us.

Having raced to the front of the store, I waited with Uncle for Adam to appear. Nothing.

After a minute, Uncle Adam, with me tagging behind, went looking for his other nephew. Rounding a corner, seated in the aisle, surrounded by one opened red canister after another was Adam, in the process of searching for Prince Albert, whom he was certain had to be in one of the many tins.

It’s adventure
That’s for sure,
As he explores
His daily chores.

“There’s nothing like kicking my own ass,” I kept thinking as I tried to fall back to sleep. It began about half-an-hour earlier when I got out of bed, still asleep and in the midst of a night-terror.

Night-terrors, for me at least, happen when I feel stressed out. In this case it is Christmas-time and I still do not have a job and so I fill my time with writing, reading, taking photos – all which leave me feeling guilty that I am not earning a paycheck.

Yes. It’s a vicious circle and both its creation and activity are all in my mind.

Anyway, in this night-terror I was the only ‘White’ face in a sea of protesting Black people. (Please don’t ask me why this is – I’ve no clue.) They were yelling, screaming and pushing me around, calling me names and accusing me of stuff that I’d never done.

And of course, me-being-me, I couldn’t keep my mouth shut as I hollered back at all these people, shoving and jostling me about. This is when my wife woke me up and I evidently got snotty with her for having done so and then jus’ as quickly as I barked at her, I was back asleep.

As I fell back to sleep, I transitioned from being in the crowd to the edge of the crowd. I was getting punched in the head by one man, kicked in the back by another and I was fighting back.

Now my wife, whom I had awaken with my screaming, was sitting up in bed, reading, when I suddenly got out of the blanket and sheets and commenced around the foot of the bed. She figured I was getting up to use the bathroom.

Instead, I was getting ready to square off on the dude that was punching me in the head. However, I never laid a hand on him, as he struck me (in my night-terror) right on the chin and as my wife put it, “you suddenly took a couple of steps backwards and fell on your ass.”

That woke me up! I had landed hard on the floor, smashing into a table, knocking the wind out of me and leaving two fairly sizable cuts on my right butt-cheek.

It took a minute or so for me to regain my breath and composure so that I could go into the bathroom to look at my injuries. (My poor wife had to take a picture of my wound because I was unable to see it in the mirror and no, I didn’t ask her to kiss my boo-boo to make it all better, either.) Other than a little blood, there is no real damage other than to my pride, which is a bit out of sorts for having lost a fight composed solely in my subconsciousness.

This morning, I’m wearing three large band-aids on my bum, I have a slightly swollen and bruised left elbow and a back that hurts worse than usual, plus it’s painful to sit. In the end, (no pun intended) I guess I could say that I’m as good a fighter as I am a punching bag — because in both cases I lost — to myself.

For the last three months I’ve been sporting a full gray-white beard. I started it on October 15, the day after my son and daughter-in-law got married on Lake Tahoe.

The day before yesterday I went to Walmart to purchase a last-minute gift for my wife. While wondering the aisles, a little girl, about five-years old and her younger brother, stopped me.

“Why are you shopping here, Santa?” she asked.

More than a little taken back, I glanced at her mother, who smile politely and was obviously enjoying her child’s error, I answered, “Because even Santa needs a little help sometimes.”

“Oh,” she responded. Then without missing a beat she asked, “Can me and my brother tell you what we want for Christmas?”

My heart melted. “Yes, you can,” I replied as I got down on one knee so she’d have a place to sit.

She whispered in my ear, telling me it was secret. When done, I responded, “That’s a big one. I think my boss will have to know about this.”

“You have a boss?’

“Yup.”

“Whose your boss?”

“God. Do you say your prayers every night?”

She nodded her head ‘yes.’

“Good,” I said, “and I’ll say a prayer that you get what you want for Christmas, too.”

She hugged me as I added, “Jus’ remember we don’t always get what we want and there’s always a reason and sometimes we don’t know what that reason is. Can you be brave if you don’t get everything you ask for?”

“Is it alright if I’m sad if I don’t get what I want?”

“It is. You can even cry and be mad.” We hugged again as she climbed from my knee.

“Thank you, Santa,” she smiled as she  went to her mom’s side and took her hand. As for the little brother, he was too shy to ask this Santa’s helper for anything.

The mom silently lipped ‘thank you,’ as she turned down the aisle. I winked at her and quickly rushed from the store without buying anything.

It took about 15 minutes before I could drive home, the tears were too much to see through as the innocence of that little girl tore my heart in two. And that night as I lay in bed, I said a special prayer with the faith that her secret – her mother’s cancer – will be healed, then I cried myself to sleep.