My allergies are terrible
today.
I can’t see out of my right eye at the moment, and my whole right side is kind of off.
No, I don’t have COVID, or the flu, or monkeypox.
My allergies are just really bad today, but give it about two hours, and I will be like new.
That is usually the regimen for me when I wake up like this.
Having bad allergies like I have is a true curse, so yes, I kind of know just how my fellow Larry, Lawrence Talbot in all of those classic werewolf movies, felt when a full moon came upon him.
“I turn into a wolf when the moon is full.”
“You and a thousand other guys!”
Well, maybe I don’t know fully what Talbot went through, at that.
But anyway, let’s get to the gist of what I wanted to write about today.
The next few days are going to be interesting, to say the least, as three dates are coming up on my calendar that bear worth mentioning.
Two I fully understand, get, and am engaged entirely with; the third, I am sorry; to say, I am not so engaged with.
Let me explain.
Saturday is the second Record Store Day of 2022, and I will be at my local record store bright and early to partake in the festivities.
This day highlights smaller, independent record stores, as well as celebrating our non-mall retail downtowns, so that dual purpose brings me to my local store as much as the goodies related to the day does.
There will be numerous special releases on Record Store Day that will be out for the taking, and while most of these are on vinyl, many are in other formats, including cassette, CD, and yes, even 8-track!
It is a fun day, and although the list of releases seemingly changes by the day, I am ready to find one or two or three releases that appeal to me and that I will buy.
And my local record store donates some of the store’s proceeds to animal-oriented enterprises, so it makes the day even that much better.
Than on Sunday, we have the holiest day of the year as far as I am concerned, which is Father’s Day.
This is the one day of the year that fathers are fully celebrated, and on my end, I am going to have a house full of people over for a barbecue, and it should be fun.
My father and father-in-law will join us in spirit, but their imprint on the day will be a good one, because without them, none of us would be here to partake in such a day.
My father simply loved barbecues, and I have certainly inherited this love from him, so when I flip a burger, I feel his presence right there.
It should be a fun day.
On the same day is a new celebration, or at least a new celebration in my neck of the woods and for the majority of the country.
It is Juneteenth, the celebration of the freedom of the last slaves under bondage, and while it is actually on June 19, the official celebration is on Monday, as it has become our newest federal holiday.
I have mixed feelings about this holiday, to be honest with you, and I admit to it.
It has been explained to me that this is a true holiday for all Americans, as it honors the date when all men were finally set free; it supposedly took a few years for this message of freedom to spread to all areas of our country.
That makes it an American holiday, because it finally wiped out the scourge of slavery from our further history.
But I also believe that there is no place for anybody other than blacks in this holiday, related to how it is perceived, how it is handled, and even how it became a national holiday in the first place.
It seems that another scourge—so-called “white guilt”—helped to propel this holiday to another level, and while I know that it has been celebrated for generations in certain parts of the country, I do believe this “white guilt” helped to pus the celebration into a more national consciousness.
Slavery was a horrid thing, an obvious stain on our past. But this holiday, to me at least, carries that stain further, rubs it into our wounds with an almost delightful vengeance, and simply separates the races even more than they already are.
What place do I have in Juneteenth?
My people were enslaved as well, my people came to this promised land in the early 20th century, my people had prejudice thrown at them too, and my people marched in the same marches and participated in the same events that led to civil rights and equality for all.
Do I have any semblance of “white guilt” in me?
No, sorry, I don’t, and to me, this is what this holiday is all about.
If I was still working full-time, I will be honest with you, I would simply look forward to Juneteenth as a day off of work, and nothing more.
You keep throwing guilt at a certain group, and eventually, there are going to be some of us in that group that will simply shrug their shoulders and move on.
Happy Juneteenth, and I again will be the first person to say that I truly do not understand its importance in my life and the life of my family.
But that’s me; I am sure people have better takes on this than I do.
Have a great weekend, great celebrations, and a lot of fun, and I will speak to you again on Monday.
I can’t see out of my right eye at the moment, and my whole right side is kind of off.
No, I don’t have COVID, or the flu, or monkeypox.
My allergies are just really bad today, but give it about two hours, and I will be like new.
That is usually the regimen for me when I wake up like this.
Having bad allergies like I have is a true curse, so yes, I kind of know just how my fellow Larry, Lawrence Talbot in all of those classic werewolf movies, felt when a full moon came upon him.
“I turn into a wolf when the moon is full.”
“You and a thousand other guys!”
Well, maybe I don’t know fully what Talbot went through, at that.
But anyway, let’s get to the gist of what I wanted to write about today.
The next few days are going to be interesting, to say the least, as three dates are coming up on my calendar that bear worth mentioning.
Two I fully understand, get, and am engaged entirely with; the third, I am sorry; to say, I am not so engaged with.
Let me explain.
Saturday is the second Record Store Day of 2022, and I will be at my local record store bright and early to partake in the festivities.
This day highlights smaller, independent record stores, as well as celebrating our non-mall retail downtowns, so that dual purpose brings me to my local store as much as the goodies related to the day does.
There will be numerous special releases on Record Store Day that will be out for the taking, and while most of these are on vinyl, many are in other formats, including cassette, CD, and yes, even 8-track!
It is a fun day, and although the list of releases seemingly changes by the day, I am ready to find one or two or three releases that appeal to me and that I will buy.
And my local record store donates some of the store’s proceeds to animal-oriented enterprises, so it makes the day even that much better.
Than on Sunday, we have the holiest day of the year as far as I am concerned, which is Father’s Day.
This is the one day of the year that fathers are fully celebrated, and on my end, I am going to have a house full of people over for a barbecue, and it should be fun.
My father and father-in-law will join us in spirit, but their imprint on the day will be a good one, because without them, none of us would be here to partake in such a day.
My father simply loved barbecues, and I have certainly inherited this love from him, so when I flip a burger, I feel his presence right there.
It should be a fun day.
On the same day is a new celebration, or at least a new celebration in my neck of the woods and for the majority of the country.
It is Juneteenth, the celebration of the freedom of the last slaves under bondage, and while it is actually on June 19, the official celebration is on Monday, as it has become our newest federal holiday.
I have mixed feelings about this holiday, to be honest with you, and I admit to it.
It has been explained to me that this is a true holiday for all Americans, as it honors the date when all men were finally set free; it supposedly took a few years for this message of freedom to spread to all areas of our country.
That makes it an American holiday, because it finally wiped out the scourge of slavery from our further history.
But I also believe that there is no place for anybody other than blacks in this holiday, related to how it is perceived, how it is handled, and even how it became a national holiday in the first place.
It seems that another scourge—so-called “white guilt”—helped to propel this holiday to another level, and while I know that it has been celebrated for generations in certain parts of the country, I do believe this “white guilt” helped to pus the celebration into a more national consciousness.
Slavery was a horrid thing, an obvious stain on our past. But this holiday, to me at least, carries that stain further, rubs it into our wounds with an almost delightful vengeance, and simply separates the races even more than they already are.
What place do I have in Juneteenth?
My people were enslaved as well, my people came to this promised land in the early 20th century, my people had prejudice thrown at them too, and my people marched in the same marches and participated in the same events that led to civil rights and equality for all.
Do I have any semblance of “white guilt” in me?
No, sorry, I don’t, and to me, this is what this holiday is all about.
If I was still working full-time, I will be honest with you, I would simply look forward to Juneteenth as a day off of work, and nothing more.
You keep throwing guilt at a certain group, and eventually, there are going to be some of us in that group that will simply shrug their shoulders and move on.
Happy Juneteenth, and I again will be the first person to say that I truly do not understand its importance in my life and the life of my family.
But that’s me; I am sure people have better takes on this than I do.
Have a great weekend, great celebrations, and a lot of fun, and I will speak to you again on Monday.
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