But Cleo wasn’t the only one that floated her boat on Denial, (The Nile….Get it?) Sigmund Freud got it right when he stated that Denial was the defense mechanism of first resort for people who couldn’t accept the truth of any given event. “This isn’t happening.” Has been the call to arm by many a doomed soul, waiting for the inevitable drop of the headman’s ax.
Touted as an enemy of Muslims by the perpetually hostile mainstream press and accompanying chorus of braying liberal enemies, the president was treated with a triumph that rivals those afforded the royalty of ancient Rome.
Saudi horsemen, some brandishing the American Flag, flank President Trumps motorcade upon his arrival in Riyadh Arabia. On the first stop of his first foreign trip as POTUS, President Trump was treated with a day of extraordinary pageantry and ceremony.
Egyptian president Al Si-Si tells Trump that he “can do the impossible.”
POTUS at the western wall in Jerusalem Israel
Trumps next stop, Israel, afforded a more humble a greeting but Trump and B.B. Netanyahu have been close friends for a quite a while. His next hit is Rome and a meeting with the Pope. In his trifecta of the Abrahamic religions, thus far, his trip has been a raging success. His predecessor, in abandoning Iraq, supporting the Muslim Brotherhood in Egyptian internal politics, and subsidizing Iranian interests to the tune of 400 billion dollars as well as his policy of non-interference in withdrawing from the middle east has left a region (that has always been problematic) in flames. The reaction of all parties, from Riyadh to Tel Aviv, has been a sigh of relief that America is back to lead them from the fray. We are back.
Below is a photo of Ivan Bracken holding his great-grandson, Jacob, in his lap. It was a good moment In our struggle against the nightmare of brain dysfunction. Ivan died of dementia a few days ago. He was my wife’s father. This is a battle that we could have placed on the shoulders of others but Debra,( his daughter my wife) promised to care for him and keep him out of the nursing home for as long as she could. Before it was over, before death freed him, (and this whole family) his symptoms were so severe that we could find no long-term care that would take him. She kept her promise.
We are just beginning the journey back to the world. We emerge shell shocked and lost, with no idea what to do next. Brain dysfunction is difficult. Brain damage with the victim still walking, is more difficult. Brain damage with the victim agitated and angry is a twenty-four hour a day seven days a week struggle with no moment of complete rest and no refuge. We are just now realizing the depth of the damage we have suffered in keeping her promise. I took Deb out to brunch a couple of days after Ivan passed on and we were both amazed that we could just leave the house without either taking poor Pa-pa with us, or at minimum, arranging for my youngest daughter and son-in-law to watch after him. Back before his struggle with brain disease he was often a difficult man, he had his faults, as we all do, but was basically a decent man. It was heartbreaking to see him deteriorate.
Deb at difficult moments, when she felt like she was inflicting him on the family that helped care for him and keep him in the home. Sometimes her strong heart would give way a little, and she would say, “He was never like this before!” Even Ivan, (if he could) would agree. He would rather take a bullet rather than endure the slow pain wracked transformation from Dr. Jekyll to Mr. Hyde.
Now it is we who are the walking wounded, wondering what we do with our lives now that we have emerged from our exile into the hell of caring for a difficult dementia victim. We are the walking wounded, not knowing what to do next or how to feel.
There is no way to convey the hell wreaked upon both Ivan and those who cared for him in the past couple of years. We just have to let the dead take care of their own, and go on living for the living. Below is a picture of the family, on the far left is Deb and on the far right (the ragged looking big guy) is me.. Between us is the family. And in the middle of it all sits Ivan.
May he find in death the peace the disease robbed him of in his final years. Did we do all we could? Could we have done it differently? We could question ourselves forever. But I believe these doubts should be buried with the man. We are vetrans of our war with dementia an we should walk on.There are grandchildren to raise and a lives to be lived.
I am grateful for the effort in caring for Ivan by my youngest daughter Alexandra and son-in law Anthony. They helped define the deeper meanings of family. But I must close by saying I have been enriched by having been a part of Debs daily fight to provide the care and dignity she felt he deserved. But for their help we could not have done it.. She is a hero of the brightest magnitude. I am privaledged to share my life with a woman of such character and through the tears, such courage. She has nothing to regret. She kept her word. I am so proud of her.
When one speaks of a “knee jerk” reaction it refers to that cute little kick that comes when the doctor whacks you in the knee with his little rubber hammer. 
A knee jerk reaction is one that comes without deliberation. It happens as a defensive gesture to an assault on a vulnerable area. It is a “push back” against applied force. Such it is with the rise in right wing hate groups springing up throughout Europe. Just “Klikdapik’ for a pretty fair little article about cultures feeling assaulted by conditions in the world today. It bodes ill for the Democracies of Europe and eventually your city council.
Word on the street is that Ex-Pres Obama is putting together (organizing) a group to sabotage President Trumps administration.
Michele, always a class act, outlines her post election plans to the DNC.
When you have nothing to lose the truth surfaces. As far as I can tell this couples motivation was the same as Charles Manson, and/or Adolf Hitler; start a race war and install a junta that suits their idea of governance from the wreckage of our nation.
I am sorry about the dirth of posting of late. I am sure you have been holding your breath awaiting the next profound revelation (humor). But there is no joy in Mudville lately. For the past cople of years Deb and I have taking care of her father, who has dementia and is presently on hospice care in our home. He is however of a special variety of disorder. His violence, resistance to co-operation and sexual improprieties (his granddaughters cannot be left in the same room, and visiting of any kind has become sparse. His mania and round the clock assaults have sucked my life and the lives of my family into a maelstrom of insanity. Dementia like his is so hard to manage that there are few long term facilities that will take him.
They call it care-taker burn out. I call it depression. There is no way to describe the despicable nature of the beastie without getting melodramatic and still not impart the tremendous stress involved. Suffice it to say we live with two barricades in my home, locked doors and alarms. The geezer has always been an selfish asshole. His demented condition has escalated his mean nature into attitudes and behavior that would have called for an exorcist in any other age. The dysthymia and major depressive bouts make formerly enjoyable activities seem a chore. Well this is my restart on my site. Sorry about the delay.
The article attached to this photo. illustrates the systemic denial toyed with by our conduits of information, the “main stream press”. It as become a social imperative to deny certain realities. …Realities that are as objectively provable as a tiger trap on a dark night. The point being, (pun intended), by the time you are proven wrong, you are impaled on bamboo stakes. I fear that our liberal’s self-flagellant take on personal worth could keep us looking at the stars rather than the path that lays ahead.
I see a land of Unicorns and clouds that look like dragons drifting by in sunny skies and a world where no one gets their feelings hurt.. The liberal daydream. A land where you don’t get staked in a Tiger trap…unless it is by candy canes and marshmallows. I see a land that never endured an existential crisis; no world war, no plague, or dissipation of economic depression. The millennium child, born of families broken by divorce, self- absorption, and self indulgence has taken to the streets. Having no great crusade or threat to the country, the millennial children define themselves through self-inflicted wounds. As a therapist I have seen many too many 12 year olds carving on themselves just to feel.
We live in the spiritual ruins of families fragmented; in LBJ’s “Great Society” where fathers no longer stay, and the government stepped in as surrogate patriarch. A place where boys without male influence, grow to bully-hood and women, once custodians of morality, have abandoned virtue to adopt the worst male behaviors in a misguided attempt to empower themselves. Now I hear the “F” word pass through female lips more than males. Profanity and promiscuity make you a man like crapping on statues and flapping your arms make you an eagle.
The Id has won the battle of the late 60’s and 70’s and the great social experiment of modern neo-socialism. But the war isn’t over. And without engaging in the eternal debate of is there or isn’t there a God, it is safe to say our sins are consuming us. It’s just not hip to be square.
But hope has not died. It may be that Trump is the tough guy who will have his feet firmly planted and his “Id” in check, his conscience clear and his ego firmly anchored to balance it all out. No matter the cradle, be it in Heaven or the mind of man, evil deeds are done all over the world and the whole of humanity is the perpetrator. I would rather fight the good fight than just sit in the bleachers, waiting for a miracle to come along and save me. There really is a force in the world called evil. Three are on the field, Villains, victims and hero’s. The great conundrum is this…..What are we made of?
Freud had a lot of rather perverse notions concerning human personality. Penis envy is the first to come to mind; in which he asserted females felt deprived of something that males had…a penis. Strange thought isn’t it. The Electra complex (murdering mom for full possession of dad), or the Oedipus complex, (the expunging of the father for full possession of the mother). Freuds basic structure of the human personality, comprised of the evil Id, the over critical Superego and the hypercritical superego is dead on. It is the struggle for primacy between these opposing drives (instincts if you will.) that brings forth either the good or the bad in men.
Trained in neurology, Freud saw the world from the micro to macro. From the ravenous feral Id to the excruciatingly criticle Super-ego, a constant psychic tug ot war battles for control of mans behavior. Will the Id win and the trigger is pulled……or will the shaming of the super-ego prevail and the gun be put peacefully back in the holster? The Id (feeding, fighting, fleeing and sex) The superego, (restraint, shaming and condemnation of the less than moral urges of the Id) and finally, the Ego the great negotiator of the mind, helps the Id get what it wants in socially acceptable ways.
Most conflict begins in the soul of each. War, murder, domestic violence , prison rape and the guy with the ‘fro’ that paints happy little trees.(God I hate that guy).Of all theories Freud’s tripartite structure to the average human personality is the most cross -culturally meaningful. Because he begins with life in it’s most primitive state and works to the most complicated organism there are no logical gaps to fill. No rationalization to whip out when there are holes in the theory….it fits. As a matter of fact the behaviours are cross special. Just ponder a mother tiger cuffing a cub when it needs to learn not to play with dangerous things. It’s the same. the parents teach the young, guides and hones their survival skills. Same thing with all species.. Same thing as a human parent teaching a kid to look both ways before stepping into the cross-walk.
So there will be evil I the world…..as long as there are men in the world. The “Devil made me do it”! or I guess I should confess I did it; which ever way. Doesn’t matter, . Whether it is born on the wind or in mens hearts, there is evil in the world and there will always be evil in the world. The good man is defined by the courage he shows grappling with himself and the world.
I guard against giving too much credence to every declaration that every little Mullah mutters. 
Trump, however, has given more than a few Muslims the rectal spasm. His tendency to do what he says he’s going to do, the exact opposite of his predecessors strategy of “Leading from Behind” sounds a lot like “Dads home Johnny, now your gonna get it!”
You don’t whip out your pocket copy of “The Prophet” for and impromptu reading as a master stroke at pounding someone’s ass!
North Korea is lead by a sociopathic dwarf with nuclear war-heads ready for delivery, Pakistan, no real friend of the west, has nuclear eggs in the silos ready to go. Iran’s Mullahs lead Death to America (the great Satan) pep rallies every week, They collect atomic centrifuges , tons of raw radioactive material, early stage ICBMs and a promise to start Armageddan by wipeing Israel of the face of the earth We respond! WE DEBATE VAGINA EMPOWERMENT!
The article attached to this pic has one defect of focus. Obama is not just the worst president in U.S. history, he is our greatest enemy. As our military strips museum exhibits for parts while functioning on a budget reduction of 29% the middle east combusts, (and the fire is spreading west). He pontificates over the sheer meanness of having solid borders while carrying water for his buddies the Cubans by eliminating the wet foot-dry foot loophole for Cuban refugees who had the gumption to make the 90 mile swim to our shores. Israel is backstabbed through the U.N. (Obama operatives machinated the betrayal) while handing Israels wailing wall to the Muslims.
THINGS ARE CHANGING NOW…….When did the Arab spring happen? It happened when Obama backed the grand poo-bah of terrorist groups, the “Muslim Brotherhood” in a take-over of Egypt. The brotherhood has been in a death match with Egyptian moderates since the 1930’s. Admittedly Egypt is still Muslim and Christians are still being persecuted. But Egypt, on the world stage for a few thousand years, does not want the clock turned back 1400 years. Things are changing now and I feel less like a stranger in a strange (I mean really strange) land.
Last Friday our stalwart Sec. of State mumbled something about sending money to the Palistinians. as he left his office for the last time……
Of course this little contribution was without the knowledge of congress and follows his screwing of Israel by just a couple of weeks.
JACKHAMMERJOHN 