Early this morning — very early, thanks to Scout and Smudge — I found my Facebook news feed full of people losing their minds over the shutdown of TikTok. The pissing and moaning, especially from otherwise reasonable folks, surprised me.
C’mon, people, pull yourselves together. Get a grip. Or a life. Or something.
Much of the rest of what I saw was the typical torrent of misquotes, pudgy aphorisms and pseudo-profundity. That’s nothing new — when I was in college, many a dorm room wall was plastered with Argus (e.g.) posters featuring lush photography and (supposedly) inspirational insights from the likes of Gibran, Jesus, and Bach (Richard, not J.S.).
Now it’s all gone digital. Now anyone can make a “poster,” no matter how shallow, pointless, or shamelessly false, and plaster it on my wall. Some days, it’s as if my news feed has been hijacked by Jack Handey.
“If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down? We might, if they screamed all the time, for no good reason.”
Jack Handey, from Deep Thoughts (1992)
(And don’t get me started about missing children, nursing-home escapees, and dogs.)
Fortunately, I’ve come to regard social media as the tool it is. I use it, but I don’t rely on it. If it all went away tomorrow, whether at the hands of the ChiComms or anti-Liberty forces within our own country, I believe I could adapt.
Quickly.
Deb came down to the wood yard yesterday as I was unloading the last of the bucked oak from my truck. She snapped several pictures, one of which I included in yesterday’s blog post.
This one:
I spent some time with that photo this morning. It has a lot to say to me.
The setting is the stuff of (my) dreams — fresh-cut firewood stacked beside a dirt road, behind it cedars and oaks and hickories. There’s a sense of depth, a valley and a long, high ridge beyond. The sky is right out of a postcard.
And I’m actually in that scene.
I’m sitting on the tailgate of a full-size, V8-powered American pickup truck, the first I’ve owned in 30 years. It’s mid-winter. I’m wearing a heavy woolen shirt-jac in my preferred buffalo plaid, along with a warm stocking hat that Deb knitted for me.
Far from navel-gazing, those are observations of aspirations fulfilled.
There’s more.
I see simplicity. I see work. I see Liberty, self-sufficiency and the independent American Life I’ve always imagined.
All in a photo.
If today turned out to be my last day on Earth — and I have no reason to believe that it is — then this likely would be the last image of me. I’d want you to see it. I’d want you to share it far and wide.
Send it to my friends, to everyone who’s ever known me, and include this message:
“He made it.”
An ordinary Sunday. The usual things.
What’s different about today is that Deb and I settled in front of the TV this afternoon and watched festivities heralding Trump’s inauguration at noon Eastern Time tomorrow.
As Megyn Kelly put it, “the goodness that’s about to rain down on us.”
The American flag will fly again over The Mountain not as a signal of distress, as it has for many months, but as a symbol of strength. Monday, January 20th, 2025 will be vindication. What follows will be comeuppance for the soulless bastards who’ve tried to destroy the country I love.
Enjoy it. I certainly will.
Take care of yourselves, Patriots. Stay calm. Stay sharp. Stay free.
#WiseUp #LibertyOrDeath #Ungovernable
#LetsGoBrandon #FJB