24 February 2015

Zax ByPass


I wish I had more time to blog.
I always find it therapeutic and it seems that a handful of you actually enjoy reading Hoosier Happenings as well.  The last several weeks have found me steeped in new responsibilities to which I've tried to throw myself at wholeheartedly so combined with work, something had to give.  But I saw a post on Facebook last night concerning community development that prompted this recollection of a story by the great philosopher, Dr. Seuss, and maybe sums up a great deal of my experiences in these first few weeks........and honestly, seems like a reflection on nearly the last "fifty-nine years" as we stand here in the prairie of Prax beneath the Zax ByPass.  Let's hope for an off-ramp and begin to pull in the same direction, together, because the world isn't going to stand still-it will grow.  Lately it's been growing around and without us.

The Zax by Dr. Seuss

One day, making tracks
In the prairie of Prax,
Came a North-Going Zax
And a South-Going Zax.

And it happened that both of them came to a place
Where they bumped.  There they stood.
Foot to foot.  Face to face.

"Look here, now!" the North-Going Zax said.  "I say!
You are blocking my path.  You are right in my way.
I'm a North-Going Zax and I always go north.
Get out of my way, now, and let me go forth!"

"Who's in whose way?" snapped the South-Going Zax.
"I always go south, making south-going tracks.
So you're in MY way!  And I ask you to move
And let me go south in my south-going groove."

Then the North-Going Zax puffed his chest up with pride.
"I never," he said, "take a step to one side.
And I'll prove to you that I won't change my ways
If I have to keep standing here fifty-nine days!"

"And I'll prove to YOU," yelled the South-Going Zax,
"That I can stand here in the prairie of Prax
For fifty-nine years!  For I live by a rule
That I learned as a boy back in South-Going School.
Never budge!  That's my rule.  Never budge in the least!
Not an inch to the west!  Not an inch to the east!
I'll stay here, not budging!  I can and I will
If it makes you and me and the whole world stand still!"

Well....
Of course the world didn't stand still.  The world grew.
In a couple of years, the new highway came through
And they built it right over those two stubborn Zax
And left them there, standing un-budged in their tracks.

Ode to a Truck

Wednesday, I took my travel companion on its last trip, from which it didn't come home with me. I took it for a drive the day before, to...