Trump's Truth

When I was trying to understand why Donald Trump, one of the seventeen, or by now eighteen, Republican presidential candidates would do and say the things he's, well, doing and saying, it occurred to me that he is simply Not Being a Politician. Politicians have a reputation for saying what they think the populace wants to hear. Trump is not doing that; he is speaking his truth...truth as he perceives it. This thought took me back to Gustave Flaubert, the nineteenth-century French author who said, "There is no truth; there is only perception of the truth." Gustave died sooner than he should have because he put his wally dinger places he shouldn't have because he didn't know the truth about syphilis. But, I digress.

Donald Trump is not compromising his beliefs in order to please others. As he tromps across sensitive feelings, tramples sacred military ground, and shoots sharp verbal darts at those who disagree with him, he is making people stand up and take notice. That's a good thing. We, the citizens of the United States of America, still have a pulse. But can we be saved?

What The Donald is saying is the truth: Trump's Truth. Trump knows exactly what he is doing. But, what do I know? I'm just a little old lady from the mountains of North Carolina who likes to ramble on and on...usually with no one listening.  I don't know what is inside the mind of Donald Trump. I can only guess that 1) He is being true to what he believes no matter how ridiculous it may sound...

or 2) he has an alternative motive.

THE 2016 REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES FOR PRESIDENT

First Row (Right to Left)

Carly Fiorina, businesswoman
Mike Huckabee, Former governor of Arkansas
Rick Perry, Former governor of Texas
Chris Christie, Governor of New Jersey
Lindsay Graham, Senator of South Carolina
Jeb Bush, Former governor of Florida

Second Row (Right to Left)

Rick Santorum, Former Senator from Pennsylvania
Rand Paul, Senator from Kentucky
Dr. Ben Carson, Neurosurgeon from Florida
Bobby Jindal, Governor of Louisiana
Mark Everson, Former IRS Commissioner*
Mario Rubio, Senator from Florida
Ted Cruz, Senator from Texas

Third Row (Right to Left)
(Those arriving late must go to the back.)

Jim Gilmore, Former Governor of Virginia
John Kasich, Governor of Ohio
George Pataki, Former Governor of New York
Scott Walker, Govenor of Wisconsin

THAT OTHER GUY STANDING BY HIMSELF

Donald Trump

As of today, July 23rd, there are now eighteen Republican candidates vying for the President's seat.

*As of August 5th, Mark Everson is running but he is not being recognized as a viable candidate, so that makes the number of Republican candidates seventeen.


To see the rest of the blog, search for "The Ramblings of an Aging Baby Boomer."

There is No Truth

There is no truth; there is only perception of the truth. But that's not really true because there are irrefutable truths, and scientific experts know what they are. They would have told you that the earth is flat, it's one of nine planets, and it's the center of the universe, a universe that is static, neither expanding or contracting. Oh, and about the continents, they don't move. Feeling a little sick? Got a touch of cholera? It's that bad toxic air that you were breathing. There's no such thing as little, tiny microscopic bug-like thingies that invade your body, make you very sick, and then you die.

See! There are truths that can't be disputed. Just ask the scientists who gave us the above truths years ago. Oh, wait a minute! You can't; they're all dead. Shoot! That's not true. Some of the scientists who told us that Pluto was the ninth planet might still be around. But they're really old by now. Darn it! That's probably not true either. Sixty is the new forty, seventy is the new fifty, so they could still be here sharing irrefutable truths.

Now that we know there are definite, undeniable truths, who was it who said "There is no truth; there is only perception of the truth" and what did the author mean by that obviously untrue statement? I asked Google and Google sent me to Wikipedia and Wikipedia pointed to Gustave Flaubert, a French writer who died in 1880 at age fifty-eight. But back then fifty-eight was the old seventy-eight so it was time for him to kick the bucket anyway...or was it? Had it not been for his wayward, nonselective, indiscriminate wally dinger, he could have lived a whole lot longer...or maybe not.

Diving Headfirst Into the Truth

I've never liked lying, even when it's one of the "okay" lies. Not telling the truth makes me feel like a fraud. Although I know that some lies avoid unpleasant situations and consequences, I feel disingenuous if I don't tell the truth. I have very little tolerance for pretend and fakery. I've tried giving up lying several times in my life, and the consequences of my honesty have reduced my friend count drastically and landed me in boiling hot water.

My sister Lynnette--who has 677 friends, 24 of whom consider her their best friend--says the reason I have no friends is because of my intolerance--she really gets on my nerves sometimes.

Well, she makes it sound as if I have no friends. I have friends. By last count yesterday, I had 102 of them on Facebook--down one from last week. I don't actually know them, though. I do remember passing some of them in the halls in high school, but I didn't associate with any of them; I couldn't tolerate their behavior--all so sophomoric and high-schoolish.

I'm in one of those times again when I just want to tell the truth. No more lies. Lynnette and her entourage have advised against my need to be 100% genuine and sincere, but I'm diving headfirst into the truth.

Facebook Friend Count: 101 and dropping.

It appears my desire to tell the truth has landed me in hot water again, so I guess it's time to move on to another subject: perception of the truth, and I'll do that when I return from my whirlwind around-the-world book tour. 

A Lying Fool

I don't lie unless the need arises. Otherwise, I have no problem telling the truth. When I was a little girl the need arose all the time. I was a lying fool and there was no doubt that I was going to H-E- double L. I didn't like the idea of spending eternity in a fiery black hole with slimy earth worms crawling all over my body--that's how my Sunday school teacher described the place--but I felt I had no choice, because everything fun in life was against my religion.  We were not allowed to go to the movies or dance or wear makeup or adorn ourselves with jewelry and fancy clothes. Even bowling was off limits. Our clothing had to cover our knees and elbows, and, of course, showing cleavage would send you straight to the fiery hole down below. I lived in a black and white world and I desperately wanted a taste of color.

So what's a child who wants to fit in her friends' world to do? This child chose to spend a lot of time at the library, or at least that's where Mother thought I was. Instead I was sitting in the front row at the Irvington Theatre enjoying Elvis move his pelvis in Jail House Rock, bowling a perfect 50 at the local bowling alley, and doing The Stroll every Friday night at a competitive church's sock hop.

Then one day the "No Bowling Rule" was lifted, so I moved from the library to the bowling alley, or at least that's where my mother thought I was. Instead I was sitting in the front row at the Irvington Theatre swooning over Elvis in King Creole, dancing the Willy and the Hand Jive at the Friday night sock hop, and spinning the bottle with neighbor kids in our breezeway after Mother went to bed.

Sometime around 1959 God revisited the rulebook and made a few changes:

Makeup - Okay in moderation

Jewelry - Okay, but not too gaudy

Fancy clothes - Okay as long as no cleavage shows

Dancing- Okay as long as you don't move hips

Knees & Elbows can be shown now

Movies - Uh...No! Still not okay

About the same time as the rulebook revisions, our minister broke one of the non-revisable rules--one of the big ten you might say--and my mother, my older sister and I did The Stroll on over to another church.  

Around the same time that we changed churches, my mother met and fell in love with one of the most wonderful men I have ever known and my world began to show some color...finally.

I Cannot Tell a Lie

Ever since six-year-old George Washington cut down his father's favorite cherry tree and then, when confronted, said "I cannot tell a lie," the pressure has been on us early-American descendants to follow George's example: always tell the truth. But the truth is that cherry-tree story is not true.

In 1809, ten years after George Washington died, Parson Mason Weems wrote a biography about the first president of the United States, and you might say he, well, exaggerated the truth a little. Okay, he lied! Are you happy now? Mr. Weems really, really, really liked George, and he wanted others to see what a great man George was, so he altered the facts a bit. Okay, he lied! Geez! You don't have to be such a stickler with the truth, do you?  Maybe, just maybe, Parson had inside information: A little old neighbor lady who saw young George confessing to his father was this author's source for the story. It could happen. I met a little old lady once who knew things about Santa Claus that would knock your socks right off the fireplace mantle, but she would only tell her stories to those who were willing to pay for them, and I didn't have my checkbook with me that day at the nursing home.

Here's my question: Is bending the truth, exaggerating the facts, fibbing a little--okay, lying--bad if the end result is good? Doesn't the end justify the means? Doesn't Mr. Weems' exuberance for and fabricated story about George Washington--the incredibly amazing Commander in Chief of the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War, the first and very likely the best president of the United States, one of the great founding fathers of this country--inspire you to always tell the truth? Good. I was hoping you'd say that. At least you're inspired. That's a start.

About Lying

Here is a post that I wrote about lying for my rambling blog on
February 11, 2012. (The drawing was not with the original post.)

One of the gallery owners who consigned my art said to me recently, "I never lie." I suspected he might be lying so I said, "Never?" "Nope! Never! I'm Catholic and Catholics don't lie," he responded. His comment took me aback, way aback. So far aback, in fact, it was 1951. I was suddenly six-years-old and sitting in a Sunday school classroom at the First Church of the Nazarene in downtown Indianapolis. As our teacher recited the Ten Commandments, I attempted to put each one into a context that I, as a small child, could understand.

Thou shall not murder.

I really like that rule.

Thou shall not steal.

That's a good rule, too, but...

Don't covet thy neighbor's ox or ass,

and don't even think about his wife.

No problem.

Don't say a cuss word and

then hyphenate God's name to it.

Does my uncle know that rule?

Don't do the nasty-nasty with an adult tree.

Does the minister know that rule?

Do not worship anything but Him.

Not even popsicles? The red ones?

Save Sundays for going to church.
What about Wednesday nights?
Can we drop that one?

There is only one God.
Does our doctor know that?

Honor your parents.
Now that's gonna be hard.

Still standing at inattention while the gallery owner, who never lies, was lying to me, my imagination was still back in Sunday school. "What about lying?" I asked my teacher as I secretly slipped a piece of Juicy Fruit gum out of the girl's purse next to me. "Oh, lying is okay. Only Catholics are not permitted to lie," she said with a straight face.

LIAR, LIAR, PANTS ON FY-EER

Everyone lies. It's all part of being human. If you are a member of the Homo sapiens genus, you lie. Oh, don't sit there all smug and highfalutin. "Well, I don't lie," you say. That's a lie and you know it. And if there's one thing I hate, it's a lying liar.

Ever since the gallery owner said he never lied, I found it hard to trust him. I drove by his house late at night, but his car was always there. He answered the phone whenever I called. He was always where he said he was going to be. And he never called me by another woman's name, but it was too late; the trust was gone. How could I believe anything he said in the future? We were over. I had to move on.

I'm with a new gallery owner now, and I'm close to popping the question: Do you lie? I feel confident he'll be honest about his lying, and, if so, we'll do just fine. I just hope he doesn't notice that every time I come into the gallery, one of his pens goes missing.

What? Don't give me that look. It's not me. I never steal.

Nine Reasons for Lying

How observant are you? Did you happen to notice in the prior post The Truth Is that there were ten people on the right side of the room but only nine people raised their hands when asked "Who among you never tells a lie?" That's me with the fly on my head. I didn't raise my hand because I'm a liar. But I only lie when the need arises. Otherwise, I have no problem telling the truth.

By my count, there are nine reasons for lying:

1. Cover Up: A cover up lie occurs when someone does (or does not do) something and they do not want others to know about it. This type of lie is not okay but sometimes is necessary when attempting to avoid very unpleasant consequences.

2. Impress Others: This type of lie occurs when someone feels they are inadequate just as they are, so they say things to give others the impression that they are more than adequate.  I'll write more about "impressing-others lies" when I return from my book tour that will take me around the world. This type of lie is okay if it helps the liar deal with their feelings of inadequacy. Like I said above, more about this when I return from my whirlwind around-the-world book tour. 

3. Spare Feelings: Sometimes lying is necessary when telling the truth hurts someone's feelings. This type of lie is okay. 

4. Avoid Consequences: Whatever the consequence might be that someone would feel the need to avoid it, lying is sometimes the only answer. This type of lie could swing either way: okay or not okay. 

5. Pathological: This is when a person feels the need to lie about pretty much everything. These types of lies could also swing either way, but really this person should not be held accountable for anything they say because they were not mentally-competent at the time of the lie.

6. Exaggerate the Facts: Bend the truth; stretch the truth. Who doesn't do that? Of course, it's okay. Let's move on.

7. Avoid Unpleasant Events or Situations: This is where most of the lies people tell fall: the need to avoid unpleasant events. I'm gonna say this type of lie is okay just because I do it all the time, and I don't want to feel bad about it.

8. Altruistic: This is when someone lies for no gain of their own. They are selfless individuals who lie to help others. I don't know anyone who would do this, but I suppose it's okay--on rare occasions--unless it involves spending time in jail.

9. Manipulation: This is when someone manipulates the truth for their own gain.  I've known people like this, and I'm going to say these lies are not okay for any reason.

There are times when a single lie can encompass more than one of the above nine reasons for lying. For example, a Cover Up can cross over into Spare Feelings and then move on to Avoid Consequences before stopping at Avoid Unpleasant Events or Situations.

Cover Up, Spare Feelings,

Avoid Consequences,

Avoid Unpleasant Events/Situations

The Truth Is

The truth is most people lie but they will lie about it and say they don't. No one ever wants to admit that they lie because, well, liars are bad people; everybody know that.

If you were to ask a room full of people "who among you never tells lies," I would bet my 401K that most people would raise their hands, because nobody wants to admit that they are bad people.

See, I told you nobody wants to admit they are bad people. But the truth is they aren't bad people--except for the lady on the far left; she's definitely trouble. Lying is a human condition; everyone does it, and once I get back from my book tour that will take me around the world, I'm going to blog about lies and why people tell them.

Doubt Nowhere in Sight

Have you ever made a split-second decision to do something with Doubt nowhere in sight, and then after the deed is done, Doubt shows up and admonishes you for not making the right decision? You feel really bad about your poor choice and this makes Doubt happy.

Just yesterday morning, Tom was getting ready to go fishing when our paths crossed as I was going from the bed to my first cup of coffee. He was carrying some blueberries that he was planning to put on his cereal, and being the doting wife that I am, I told him to continue getting ready for his fishing trip, and I would fix his cereal a la blueberries.

But on the way to the kitchen, I tripped and all of the blueberries fell on the floor.

I hurriedly picked them up and put them back in their container.

It was then that I made the decision that "a little dirt never hurt anyone," and in the bowl they went. It was a split-second decision with Doubt nowhere in sight.

I did feel a little sheepish when Tom said these particular blueberries were crunchier than normal but the best ones he had ever tasted.

But then Doubt showed up and I felt really bad.

Tom doesn't know about the blueberry incident and my unpleasant encounter with Doubt, so don't tell him, okay?

The Thing About Doubt

The thing about Doubt--as it relates to self--is you never know if its telling you the truth or just feeding you a line of bull. It will imply that it knows things you don't know--it's much more intelligent than you are--and because of its vast knowledge, it could be very unwise to doubt Doubt.

I've doubted Doubt before and accomplished impressive feats, like that one time--three times actually--when I refused to accept Doubt's concern that the parachute wouldn't open and I would die a horrible death. Doubt was wrong then and it's been wrong many times since, but it still has a powerful hold over me.  Its annoying interruptions in my life can be explained away, Doubt says, by having my best interest at heart. Its purpose is to help me make the right choices in life, keep me from overstating my worth and overreaching my capabilities--like drawing cartoons for example.  Doubt also helps me avoid embarrassing situations, as well as warns me of impending danger.

EMBARRASSING SITUATION

A question posed to me while playing a board game designed to pick out the dumbest participants in the game: "How many seconds are in a minute?"

Doubt: "Don't answer; it's a trick question."

Me: "No, Doubt, I think it's a straight-forward question. I can answer this."

Doubt: "There's a whole lot of people looking at you right now. If you're wrong...just saying."

Me: "But...but...Doubt, I know the answer...I think...but what if I'm wrong? It could be embarrassing."

Doubt: "Just say 'Pass.'  Don't risk being the dumbest person here."

IMPENDING DANGER!

Me: "Okay, I've checked all of the doors and windows; they're locked. I've looked in all of the closets and under the beds. There are no boogey men in the house. I am confident I can go to bed now knowing I'm safe."

Doubt: "Did you look behind the shower curtain? Boogey men like to hide with their chainsaws behind shower curtains. Death by chainsaw is horrible...just saying."

Oh, no! I forgot to check the shower.

I'M GOING TO DIE A HORRIBLE DEATH!

Doubt Slime

Within seconds after my friend told me that my cartoon drawings leave something to be desired,  a big ugly blob of doubt slime handed on my head and wouldn't leave. Taking her comment and adding even more insult, Doubt Slime said, "Your drawings suck! Take them out back and burn them NOW!" 

It wasn't until after I lit the match and Doubt Slime slid off my head and slithered away that I realized I had possibly misunderstand my friend. Maybe what she meant was my drawings were something she desired. They weren't bad at all; they were good, so I ran as fast as I could back to the fire pit behind the outhouse and stomped out the flames with my bare feet.

Okay that last part is an exaggeration. I had my shoes on. But the real story here is that Doubt Slime is gone. No more doubt. My drawings are good. My friend said so, so I think I'll start using more of them in my blog.

Something to be Desired

...and then it hit me.

Oh, hello there. You caught me in the middle of a thought. My friend had said something that I took as a negative comment --"Your cartoons leave something to be desired"--and I proceeded to make decisions (regarding my cartoons) based on the undeniable, irrefutable FACT that my drawings sucked. One person said so, so it must be true. I deleted them from my blog and they didn't make it into my last book I Got Out of Bed for Sesame Street...and then a lightbulb turned on in my head; possibly I misunderstood my friend.  Maybe she didn't dislike my cartoons after all.

We Americans like to use figurative instead of literal terms, such as metaphors, cliques and nonsensical collections of words to communicate. I do it all the time. Can you catch someone in the middle of a thought? How do you take a negative comment? Can drawings suck and thoughts hit? And what about those lightbulbs turning on and off in our head?

See what I mean? Communication can be confusing. And with most communication these days being done via emails and texts, the possibility for misunderstanding increases. When Tom asked his son, Michael, if he wanted to go to dinner with us and he said "I'm down with that,"  I interpreted that statement as "I would rather eat worms than have dinner with the two of you." Maybe it's just me but doesn't "I'm down with that" seem like a negative thing to say? Wouldn't "I'm up with that" make more sense? Doesn't that sound more positive? Oh, never mind. Let''s get back to my friend and her comment, "Your cartoons leave something to be desired." 

It's up to me to accept or reject those negative thoughts that cause me to doubt myself, and right now I choose to reject that pesky little demon that has plagued me for years: doubt. No more doubt. Nope! No way, Jose. Doubt be gone. Doubt not welcome here. My friend likes my cartoons; they leave her with desire, and that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Gotta Take the Bad with the Good

You may have seen this cartoon illustration before--I posted it in June 2014--but when a friend said "your drawings leave something to be desired" I deleted it. I took that comment to mean I'm not a good drawer of cartoon characters. The comment hurt my feelings. I'm sensitive that way, plus I'm a doubter. I doubt myself a lot, so when someone says I'm not a good drawer, I believe them.

A year later, I am rethinking my thinking that someone else's thinking is more important than my thinking, and right now I'm thinking my drawings are pretty dang good. So here again is my cartoon called "Take the Bad with the Good."

Okay, on second thought, maybe my friend is right. Maybe I'm not a good cartoon drawer. I'll sleep on it tonight and delete it tomorrow.