July 27: "Mink," Book Club, Hunger

Mary Oliver encounters a . , , 

Mink

by:  Mary Oliver

A mink,

     jointless as heat, was

tip-toeing along

     the edge of the creek,

which was still in its coat of snow,

     yet singing--I could hear it!--

the old song

     of brightness.

It was one of those places,

     turning and twisty,

that Ruskin might have painted, though

     he didn't.  And there were trees

leaning this way and that,

     seed-beaded.

buckthorn mostly, but at the moment

     no bird, the only voice

that of the covered water--like a long,

     unknotted thread, it kept

slipping through.  The mink

     had a hunger in him

bigger than his shadow, which was gathered

     like a sheet of darkness under his

neat feet which were busy

     making dents in the snow.  He sniffed

slowly and thoroughly in all

     four directions, as though

it was a prayer to the whole world, as far

     as he could capture its beautiful

smells--the iron of the air, the blood

     of necessity.  Maybe, for him, even

the pink sun fading away to the edge

     of the world had a smell,

of roses, or of terror, who knows

     what his keen nose was

finding out.  For me, it was the gift of the winter

     to see him.  Once, like a hot, dark-brown pillar,

he stood up--and then he ran forward, and was gone.

     I stood awhile and then walked on

over the white snow; the terrible, gleaming

     loneliness.  It took me, I suppose,

something like six more weeks to reach

     finally a patch of green, I paused so often

to be glad, and grateful, and even then carefully across

the vast, deep woods I kept looking back.

Everyone has hunger in their lives, just like the mink.  The mink, it seems, is on the prowl for food, following the smells from all four directions, unsure which way will yield dinner.  Going north may offer up salmon or venison.  South, fried green tomatoes.  West, guacamole and chips.  East, hot dogs and chili fries.  Food is the mink's primary motivation.  He's chasing his nose.

Tonight, I met with my book club.  We had barbecue and talked about black cake and the end of the world.  This after a day of meetings and emails at the library.  It was good to sit in my friend's backyard, laugh, eat, talk, and relax.  Yes, you can unwind discussing dystopian literature--it's sort of like eating your last meal before being executed.  

Think about it--if you know it's your last day on this planet, what food would you choose to eat?  Who would you hang with?  I love grilled bratwurst.  Love talking literature with smart, funny people.  Love warm summer nights that stretch on and on, jointless as heat, as Oliver says.  Tonight was a perfect way to kick off the weekend.  With people I love, eating good food, talking about great writing (or bad writing--doesn't matter).

My book club has been meeting for over 20 years.  Members have come and gone.  Some moved away.  Some got busy raising growing families.  Some died.  My mother used to be a member, and my sister, Sally (although she never read the books--she just showed up for the food and to play with my kids).  The core group who show up have been my friends for over two decades.  They have seen me at my best and worst, and they still keep coming back for more.

The gathering broke up just as dark clouds stacked up in the sky.  By the time I hit my hometown's city limits, it was a full-on torrent.  The kind of storm that makes it impossible to see more than two or three feet in front of the car.  The rain was slicing through the air sideways, and the trees along the streets were a chaos of wind and lightning.

Sometimes, you don't know you're hungry until you start eating.  I didn't know how much I needed a meal of laughter and friendship until we sat down at the table with our plates.  Usually, at the end of long days, I become J. D. Salinger.  I don't want to talk to anybody or give people directions or be social in any way.  Tonight, I had a three-hour dinner conversation about healthcare and plagues and family and cults and secular saints, and it was like medicine for my exhausted mind and spirit.

Saint Marty gives thanks for literate friends who are more like family.  And for cleansing rain.  Hallelujah and amen.

July 4: Independence Day, Barbecue, "After the Fireworks"

It was a strange Independence Day.  No parades or community picnics.  No snow cones or cotton candy.  No corn on the cob dripping with butter and salt.  And, at dusk, no huge fireworks display to "ooohhhh" and "aaaahhhhh" at.

Instead, I slept in.  Got up and made my family breakfast.  After running a few errands, I took a nap.  Played the pipe organ for a Saturday evening Mass.  Then, I drove out to a camp on a lake, where I feasted on shish kebob and bratwurst.  As dusk crept in, we shot off some fireworks purchased at a road-side stand.

As I said, it was strange.  Unlike any Independence Day that I can recall in my adult life.  Its sedate pace brought to us by the pandemic.  But it was also wonderful, full of the miracles of family and togetherness and laughter.

And for that, Saint Marty gives thanks.

After the Fireworks

by:  Martin Achatz

We walk to our car in the dark,

blankets cradled in our arms,

stars as distant as the morning

we first met, marriage and kids

not even ingredients in the roux

of our thoughts, just longing for

when we could come together

on a beach, wade into lake

water, hands and lips weightless

as jellyfish on our bodies,

stinging, pulling back, gliding

over and in and around, skin

a night sky on July fourth,

full of comet, spark, tail, waterfall.

Peony.  Chrysanthemum.  Diadem.

Crossette.  Kamuro.  Bengal fire.

Afterward, as we dressed, we

still smelled our combustion,

tasted potassium, nitrogen, copper

on our tongues for hours.

Tonight, we load belongings

into our Ford.  Books, sparklers,

half-eaten bag of cotton candy,

our daughter, still dazzled

by Summer Storm and Pyro Glyphics.

We drive home in silence

after the fireworks, think of how

we, on this Independence Day,

depend on each other, how we

still climb into bed each night,

hungry to be blinded again.

May 24: Barbecue, Normal, Poem from "Kyrie"

This afternoon, I had a socially distanced Memorial Day weekend barbecue at my parents' house.  My wife, kids, and I sat on the back porch, six feet away from my sisters and mother, and ate hot dogs and bratwurst and watermelon. 

We hadn't been together like that since mid-March.  Yes, we were careful, even though my sister, Rose, who has Down syndrome, really didn't comprehend the six-foot distance rule and tried several times to approach and hug us.  It wasn't "normal" by any means.  But it was as close as we could get to the Sunday dinners we used to have pre-pandemic.

I've heard people bridling against the term "new normal" recently.  Sometimes that bridling borders on anger.  I understand the emotions behind this reaction.  It's a symptom of mourning.  People are grieving all that has been lost because of Covid-19:  making a quick trip to the grocery store to satisfy your craving for Cheetos; stopping to check on your elderly parents on your way home from work; sitting in a church pew beside your neighbors on a Sunday morning and catching up; going for a walk and not having to wear a face mask; attending community parades and events.  All these things have become part of history for now.  The world has shifted, and not gradually.  The change was seismic.  A rift in the fabric of society that appeared almost overnight.  And it has left all of humankind reeling from the loss.

Yet I don't think it's healthy to maintain a death-hold on the "normal" we used to know.  Doing that will simply prolong the pandemic.  By refusing to put on that face mask, insisting on gathering in bars or restaurants or churches, people are not re-establishing normal.  They are just refusing to deal with their grief (and also spreading the virus more, pushing us toward another complete shutdown).  It's like setting a place at the dinner table for a person who has died.  It may feel comforting to cling to the habit, but the deceased person's chair will still remain empty.

So let's not think of "old" normal or "new" normal.  Let's not think of normal at all.  If you know my family, normal is not a word that comes to mind anyway.  Instead, let's think about how to respect each other, support each other, love each other.  That's what will get us all through this.

Tonight, I celebrate time spent with family.  Safely.  Filled with laughter and teasing.  The miracle of togetherness.

And for that, Saint Marty gives thanks.

poem from Kyrie

by:  Ellen Bryant Voigt

What were they thinking--everyone we knew,
in school, in church, took me aside
to praise--to me--my sister, as if
I were another of her parents,
or else they were, that proud and fond:
aren't you lucky, isn't she gifted,
doesn't she look grand in her new blue suit?
I had a new suit cut from the same bolt,
quick mind, good heart--vivid blossoms
in other light--yes yes, she did, she was,
what were they thinking?  Terrible,
to be the one who should have died.

May 26: Gam, Memorial Day, Freedom

The ostensible reason why Ahab did not go on board of the whaler we had spoken was this: the wind and sea betokened storms. But even had this not been the case, he would not after all, perhaps, have boarded her- judging by his subsequent conduct on similar occasions- if so it had been that, by the process of hailing, he had obtained a negative answer to the question he put. For, as it eventually turned out, he cared not to consort, even for five minutes, with any stranger captain, except he could contribute some of that information he so absorbingly sought. But all this might remain inadequately estimated, were not something said here of the peculiar usages of whaling-vessels when meeting each other in foreign seas, and especially on a common cruising-ground.

If two strangers crossing the Pine Barrens in New York State, or the equally desolate Salisbury Plain in England; if casually encountering each other in such inhospitable wilds, these twain, for the life of them, cannot well avoid a mutual salutation; and stopping for a moment to interchange the news; and, perhaps, sitting down for a while and resting in concert: then, how much more natural that upon the illimitable Pine Barrens and Salisbury Plains of the sea, two whaling vessels descrying each other at the ends of the earth- off lone Fanning's Island, or the far away King's Mills; how much more natural, I say, that under such circumstances these ships should not only interchange hails, but come into still closer, more friendly and sociable contact. And especially would this seem to be a matter of course, in the case of vessels owned in one seaport, and whose captains, officers, and not a few of the men are personally known to each other; and consequently, have all sorts of dear domestic things to talk about.

For the long absent ship, the outward-bounder, perhaps, has letters on board; at any rate, she will be sure to let her have some papers of a date a year or two later than the last one on her blurred and thumb-worn files. And in return for that courtesy, the outward-bound ship would receive the latest whaling intelligence from the cruising-ground to which she may be destined, a thing of the utmost importance to her. And in degree, all this will hold true concerning whaling vessels crossing each other's track on the cruising-ground itself, even though they are equally long absent from home. For one of them may have received a transfer of letters from some third, and now far remote vessel; and some of those letters may be for the people of the ship she now meets. Besides, they would exchange the whaling news, and have an agreeable chat. For not only would they meet with all the sympathies of sailors, but likewise with all the peculiar congenialities arising from a common pursuit and mutually shared privations and perils.

Nor would difference of country make any very essential difference; that is, so long as both parties speak one language, as is the case with Americans and English. Though, to be sure, from the small number of English whalers, such meetings do not very often occur, and when they do occur there is too apt to be a sort of shyness between them; for your Englishman is rather reserved, and your Yankee, he does not fancy that sort of thing in anybody but himself. Besides, the English whalers sometimes affect a kind of metropolitan superiority over the American whalers; regarding the long, lean Nantucketer, with his nondescript provincialisms, as a sort of sea-peasant. But where this superiority in the English whaleman does really consist, it would be hard to say, seeing that the Yankees in one day, collectively, kill more whales than all the English, collectively, in ten years. But this is a harmless little foible in the English whale-hunters, which the Nantucketer does not take much to heart; probably, because he knows that he has a few foibles himself.

So, then, we see that of all ships separately sailing the sea, the whalers have most reason to be sociable- and they are so. Whereas, some merchant ships crossing each other's wake in the mid-Atlantic, will oftentimes pass on without so much as a single word of recognition, mutually cutting each other on the high seas, like a brace of dandies in Broadway; and all the time indulging, perhaps, in finical criticism upon each other's rig. As for Men-of-War, when they chance to meet at sea, they first go through such a string of silly bowings and scrapings, such a ducking of ensigns, that there does not seem to be much right-down hearty good-will and brotherly love about it at all. As touching Slave-ships meeting, why, they are in such a prodigious hurry, they run away from each other as soon as possible. And as for Pirates, when they chance to cross each other's cross-bones, the first hail is- "How many skulls?"- the same way that whalers hail- "How many barrels?" And that question once answered, pirates straightway steer apart, for they are infernal villains on both sides, and don't like to see overmuch of each other's villanous likenesses.

But look at the godly, honest, unostentatious, hospitable, sociable, free-and-easy whaler! What does the whaler do when she meets another whaler in any sort of decent weather? She has a "Gam," a thing so utterly unknown to all other ships that they never heard of the name even; and if by chance they should hear of it, they only grin at it, and repeat gamesome stuff about "spouters" and "blubber-boilers," and such like pretty exclamations. Why it is that all Merchant-seamen, and also all Pirates and Man-of-War's men, and Slave-ship sailors, cherish such a scornful feeling towards Whale-ships; this is a question it would be hard to answer. Because, in the case of pirates, say, I should like to know whether that profession of theirs has any peculiar glory about it. It sometimes ends in uncommon elevation, indeed; but only at the gallows. And besides, when a man is elevated in that odd fashion, he has no proper foundation for his superior altitude. Hence, I conclude, that in boasting himself to be high lifted above a whaleman, in that assertion the pirate has no solid basis to stand on.

But what is a Gam? You might wear out your index-finger running up and down the columns of dictionaries, and never find the word, Dr. Johnson never attained to that erudition; Noah Webster's ark does not hold it. Nevertheless, this same expressive word has now for many years been in constant use among some fifteen thousand true born Yankees. Certainly, it needs a definition, and should be incorporated into the Lexicon. With that view, let me learnedly define it.

GAM. NOUN- A social meeting of two (or more) Whaleships, generally on a cruising-ground; when, after exchanging hails, they exchange visits by boats' crews, the two captains remaining, for the time, on board of one ship, and the two chief mates on the other.

There is another little item about Gamming which must not be forgotten here. All professions have their own little peculiarities of detail; so has the whale fishery. In a pirate, man-of-war, or slave ship, when the captain is rowed anywhere in his boat, he always sits in the stern sheets on a comfortable, sometimes cushioned seat there, and often steers himself with a pretty little milliner's tiller decorated with gay cords and ribbons. But the whale-boat has no seat astern, no sofa of that sort whatever, and no tiller at all. High times indeed, if whaling captains were wheeled about the water on castors like gouty old aldermen in patent chairs. And as for a tiller, the whale-boat never admits of any such effeminacy; and therefore as in gamming a complete boat's crew must leave the ship, and hence as the boat steerer or harpooneer is of the number, that subordinate is the steersman upon the occasion, and the captain, having no place to sit in, is pulled off to his visit all standing like a pine tree. And often you will notice that being conscious of the eyes of the whole visible world resting on him from the sides of the two ships, this standing captain is all alive to the importance of sustaining his dignity by maintaining his legs. Nor is this any very easy matter; for in his rear is the immense projecting steering oar hitting him now and then in the small of his back, the after-oar reciprocating by rapping his knees in front. He is thus completely wedged before and behind, and can only expand himself sideways by settling down on his stretched legs; but a sudden, violent pitch of the boat will often go far to topple him, because length of foundation is nothing without corresponding breadth. Merely make a spread angle of two poles, and you cannot stand them up. Then, again, it would never do in plain sight of the world's riveted eyes, it would never do, I say, for this straddling captain to be seen steadying himself the slightest particle by catching hold of anything with his hands; indeed, as token of his entire, buoyant self-command, he generally carries his hands in his trowsers' pockets; but perhaps being generally very large, heavy hands, he carries them there for ballast. Nevertheless there have occurred instances, well authenticated ones too, where the captain has been known for an uncommonly critical moment or two, in a sudden squall say- to seize hold of the nearest oarsman's hair, and hold on there like grim death.

Ahab is not feeling all the sociable.  There is no gam between the crews of the Pequod and Albatross.  Unless the captain of the Albatross has news of the white whale, Ahab is uninterested, even hostile.  I think he sees such an interaction as a distraction from his mission of revenge.  I cringe every time I type a phrase like "mission of revenge."  It is bad writing, but an apt description of Ahab's motivation.  He only has one thing on his mind, to the detriment of ship, crew, health, and happiness.

It is Memorial Day weekend.  For my non-American readers, Memorial Day (which happens on the last Monday in May) celebrates members of the American armed forces who have been killed in battle--in the Civil War, Spanish American War, World War I, World War II, Korean War, Vietnam War, Gulf Wars, and Afghanistan.  Typing out that list of conflicts really drives home how much war has shaped recent history.  It's a little sobering.

However, most people in the United States don't really spend a whole lot of time honoring these fallen soldiers this weekend.  Instead, Memorial Day is simply an excuse not to work, to travel and have family barbecues.  In a way, these three days are the equivalent of what Melville describes as a gam.  Family and friends going out of their way to see each other, eating and drinking and telling stories.  It's become the unofficial launch of the summer.

I don't mind the gam nature of this weekend.  I like seeing friends and family.  I like eating barbecued hot dogs and watermelon and corn on the cob.  Enjoy the celebration of summer freedom.  As a kid, I remember this weekend as a time to run under sprinklers in the afternoon, play outside with friends until dusk, catch frogs and fireflies in the night.  Campfires.  My parents sitting in lawn chairs, drinking from long-necked beer bottles.

On Monday, I will take my kids to a Memorial Day parade.  Then, we will drive out to the cemetery for a Veterans of Foreign Wars ceremony.  There will be a 21-gun salute.  Taps will be played.  My daughter and son have been attending these events since they were babies.  I like to remind them that it's not all about getting a day off from school, that it's not all gam.  Afterward, it will be family and barbecue, as required.

I believe in honoring veterans.  They paid a lot so that I can sit here in McDonald's with my son and sister, eat, and write this blog post without fear of some government agent rushing in to arrest me.  I can criticize the President of the United States.  Disagree with Congress.  Point out that it's just as patriotic to stand for the national anthem as it is to kneel.  Because that's what my country should be.  It's what those men and women died for.  Freedom.

Saint Marty is thankful today for all fighters for democracy and freedom.

July 2: Mutts of the World, Gregory Djanikian, "Immigrant Picnic"

One of the traditions of Independence Day celebrations in the United States is the picnic.  Hot dogs and hamburgers and watermelon.  The barbecue grill smoking.  The meat sizzling.  Last year, I think my kids were running under the sprinkler because it was so hot.

There's something very free about cooking and eating outside.  Even though we have gas grills now that ignite with the flick of a switch, barbecuing still feels rustic.  It makes me think of pioneers cooking deer and beaver meat over a fire.  (Okay, I know I'm venturing into Little House on the Prairie territory here.)  It's a connection that is very real for me, though.

I know the citizens of the United States did not invent the picnic barbecue.  It's a tradition that was probably brought to this country by all kinds of different immigrant groups.  But that's what America is all about.  We're the mutts of the world.

Saint Marty can't wait to have a little German bratwurst on the Fourth of July.

Immigrant Picnic

by:  Gregory Djanikian

It's the Fourth of July, the flags

are painting the town,

the plastic forks and knives

are laid out like a parade.

And I'm grilling, I've got my apron,

I've got potato salad, macaroni, relish,

I've got a hat shaped   

like the state of Pennsylvania.

I ask my father what's his pleasure

and he says, "Hot dog, medium rare,"

and then, "Hamburger, sure,   

what's the big difference,"   

as if he's really asking.

I put on hamburgers and hot dogs,   

slice up the sour pickles and Bermudas,

uncap the condiments. The paper napkins   

are fluttering away like lost messages.

"You're running around," my mother says,   

"like a chicken with its head loose."

"Ma," I say, "you mean cut off,

loose and cut off  being as far apart   

as, say, son and daughter."

She gives me a quizzical look as though   

I've been caught in some impropriety.

"I love you and your sister just the same," she says,

"Sure," my grandmother pipes in,

"you're both our children, so why worry?"

That's not the point I begin telling them,

and I'm comparing words to fish now,   

like the ones in the sea at Port Said,   

or like birds among the date palms by the Nile,

unrepentantly elusive, wild.   

"Sonia," my father says to my mother,

"what the hell is he talking about?"

"He's on a ball," my mother says.

                                                      

"That's roll!" I say, throwing up my hands,

"as in hot dog, hamburger, dinner roll...."

"And what about roll out the barrels?" my mother asks,

and my father claps his hands, "Why sure," he says,

"let's have some fun," and launches   

into a polka, twirling my mother   

around and around like the happiest top,   

and my uncle is shaking his head, saying

"You could grow nuts listening to us,"   

and I'm thinking of pistachios in the Sinai

burgeoning without end,   

pecans in the South, the jumbled

flavor of them suddenly in my mouth,

wordless, confusing,

crowding out everything else.

May 28: Quick Run, Quick Post, Quick Pic

I went for a quick run this afternoon.  When I say quick, I don't mean I was running quickly.  I mean I was running at my normal, plodding pace, but I only ran for about a mile and a half.  It took me about twenty minutes or so.  It was hot and humid.  I was sweating like an icicle in Fiji by the time I was done.

The food is almost done cooking for the barbecue, but I wanted to send out one more quick post today.  I've been lazy in almost every other aspect of my life, so I figured I better do something of merit.  I'm not sure if this post counts.  Any how, the bratwursts are grilling, and the watermelon is cut.

My daughter took the picture below with my iPad while we were at the cemetery for the Memorial Day service this morning.  This sign is hanging at the grave of my wife's mother, who was taken away from us too soon.  She died before my wife graduated from college and long before our wedding.  Her mother, obviously, never met our daughter.  My wife still misses her mother terribly.

Saint Marty going to spend some time with the people he loves now.

In honor of a wonderful lady

May 27: War Movies, Barbecue, Remembering, New Cartoon

In the United States, the fourth Monday in May is set aside as a day of remembrance.  We call it "Memorial Day."  We spend time on this day remembering soldiers who have died in wars.  Some of the wars the U.S. has fought haven't been popular (if war can be popular).  Korea.  Vietnam.  The Gulf War.  Iraq.  Afghanistan.  However, men and women who surrendered their lives defending a cause deserve to be honored.

I'm not a big believer in war.  I don't even like my son to play with toy guns.  There's too much violence in this world.  What I believe we do on Memorial Day is give thanks for the peace we, as citizens of the U.S., have.  And we give thanks for the people who gave their lives so we could enjoy that peace.  There are, literally, millions of people who died so that I could do things like type this blog post on a Sunday afternoon.  So that my father could sit in his living room and watch old war movies all day long (much to my mother's chagrin and annoyance).  So that I could get together with my family this evening and have a barbecue, eat hot dogs and bratwurst, and argue politics or whether Goofy is a dog or a man.  That's what all those people fought for, died for.  For the idea of happiness.

Tomorrow morning, I will take my daughter and son to a Memorial Day parade.  Then, we will go to the cemetery to take part in a Veterans of Foreign Wars Memorial Day service.  I want my kids to know that tomorrow isn't just about having a day off school.  It's isn't just about getting to sleep in late.  It's about honor.  It's about remembering.

Today, Saint Marty salutes all the fallen war veterans of the world.

Confessions of Saint Marty

July 28: Book Club Tonight, Barbecue and Rain

Tonight, I have my annual Book Club barbecue.  As usual, rain is forecasted.  It never fails.  The Upper Peninsula could be in drought conditions, and, on the night of the barbecue, we will have enough rain to turn the Gobi into another Great Lake.  We will still be having the barbecue, come hell or very high water and winds.  I'm in charge of getting the coals going, so I'm going to need a lot of help.

Have umbrella, will barbecue

I am almost done with the book for today, another Wally Lamb.  It's quite good.  I wasn't sure if I was going to enjoy it, but I am.  Now I just have to finish the damn thing.

Saint Marty has to hit the book today.

July 24: Taking a Deep Breath, Barbecue, New Cartoon

Well, after yesterday's whirlwind tour of Houghton and Hancock, today was much more sedate.  I even took a small nap in the afternoon.  We had barbecue at my parents' house for dinner.  Hot dogs and bratwurst.  Now, it's the end of the day, and the only thing I've accomplished is drawing two new cartoons. 

Saint Marty, just chillin'.

Confessions of Saint Marty

August 10: Saint Lawrence

I'm baaaaa-aaaaack!

Sorry about my prolonged absence from the blog.  For my two or three loyal readers, I will try to make it up to you by writing a couple posts this week.  However, I was on vacation for the last week or so.  No where near a computer, keyboard, monitor, i-Pad, whatever.  Basically, all I've been doing is reading; playing with my almost-two-year-old son and almost-tween daughter; spending some much-needed quality time with my wife; and soaking up the final hot days of summer before the long slide into autumn.

So I have a few points of business to take care of.  First, my friend from Georgia had an operation and is recuperating, so I want anyone who reads this to send healing thoughts and prayers her way.  Second, my pastor friend and his wife had a baby last Friday night, so I want to send a shout-out to the little Twilight girl (that's an inside joke--sorry, I try not to be cryptic and cutesie in my posts, but I'm just coming off a ten-day break; my inner sarcastic child has not woken up yet).

I didn't do anything spiritually fulfilling during my time off.  I didn't build a school in the Ozarks.  I didn't volunteer in a soup kitchen in inner-city Detroit.  I didn't work for Habitat for Humanity (you don't want to see me with power tools, believe me!).  The closest thing I did  for charity was purchase The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner.  For those of you who don't know, for each copy of the book that is sold, one dollar is donated to the American Red Cross.  So, I killed two birds with one stone.  I got a birthday present for a friend and assuaged my Christian guilt a little bit.  Not much.  A little.

I'm not sure I've ever read about a saint taking a vacation.  But it's gotta get tiring being holy 24-7.  I know I couldn't handle it.  I'm way too self-absorbed, to quote a good friend.  Lawrence, the saint for today, is the patron of the poor and of cooks.  The reason he's the patron of the poor:  when he was ordered to turn over the "treasures of the Church" to the Roman government, Lawrence gathered over a thousand beggars, street people, and destitute children.  All the gold and silver the Roman Prefect was seeking had been sold as alms for the assembled crowd.  The reason Lawrence is the patron of cooks:  the Prefect had him roasted over a fire pit for his defiance of Rome.  Lawrence is reputed to have told his torturers, "This side's done, turn me over and have a bite."  On a side note, he's also the patron saint of comedians.

I don't think Lawrence took any paid time off.  If he had, I'm sure he would have skipped the barbecue.  I also don't think he and I were cut from the same cloth, although I appreciate his sense of humor.  I could see his death as part of a Monty Python skit, with John Cleese as the saint-kabob.  Like Lawrence, most of the holy people I've read about seem to think having time away from work has to involve fasting 40 days in the desert.

Me, I opt for a trip to a water park, a bag of Cheetos, and a trashy novel.