How you look at things really depends upon which shoes you wear. We all think we know everything, and yet we actually know very little. Even those of us who have many years of advanced education know very little, and if our advanced education was any good (because nowadays the “goodness” of the education being presented is really in question), the first thing it should have taught us is that even when we’re experts we actually know very little of what there is to know.
My Doctoral adviser told me, when I first started my Doctoral studies, that none of the professors wanted to know my opinion about anything until I had the letters after my name. What he was saying, and he did articulate this directly, was that the word I should be absent in my papers, that the professors were only interested in valid research to support any thesis presented. He was careful to assert the necessity for balance at the same time. When one looks at an issue, one must look at all the research, not just one strain. When one ignores the opposing point of view and its valid research, the balance scale is tipped and the end result is often skewed if not visibly ridiculous.
So what my Doctoral Adviser was actually saying was that there are rules to research that must be followed and that when the rules are not followed the research and findings are generally not valid.
A good example of this is the climate change issue in America. When all the research is funded by the agency (the US Government) and the researchers’ funding is dependent upon findings which support the best interests of the agency’s position (in the Obama administration it was that climate change was our biggest problem and concern), there’s a good bet that all the research is going to reflect the agency’s position. Compound this with the Attorney General and many State Attorneys General literally prosecuting researchers whose findings contradicted the government’s position—yes for those of us with short memories, which our government officials count on us having, that is what happened—it becomes a really safe bet that the research, its findings and premises then being sold to us by people with political agendas is very skewed and imbalanced.
This does not mean to say that none of the research is valid or that climate change is not an issue. It is only to attest to the notion that research needs to be balanced to actually aim toward discovering truth. When people in power rewrite the rules of research to obtain the results they want and use the powers of money and litigation to suppress differing research, we’ve got a real crisis and it’s a good bet they’re not interested in truth.
A good example of balance is when Al Sharpton and Newt Gingrich went on the road together in support of supporting failing schools in the cities. Sharpton and Gingrich on the road together. Now those two don’t see eye to eye on much, but when from their differing viewpoints they come to the same conclusions, it’s a good bet that overall they were heading toward a truth. In this case it was that there is a real problem with inner-city education.
So which shoes do you wear? There are many different viewpoints in many different areas, and none of us really know anything compared to what there is to know. When we start acting like we know everything and are right about everything and we use power to demand others see it our way, we’re in real trouble.
Take a look out there. Maybe stop and think sometimes before you cut and paste something on your social media whose veracity you haven’t checked out. It’s time to get back to real research and move away from believing our politicians (on both sides) who continually spout all or nothing arguments. Anyone who knows anything about debate knows the all or nothing argument is a fallacious one.
Einstein said: “Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I’m not sure about the former.”
By Peter Weiss
Hard to believe that we’re living in America. Hard to believe that we’ve come to here, to this point in our country’s development, the point where I can’t say what I believe or feel.
It’s nothing really new. I was a teacher in New York. In case you hadn’t noticed about New York… In case you hadn’t noticed, the UFT and AFT have been in the Democrats’ pocket forever, so there in the Bronx where I taught anyone who did not sign-on to the left-wing shenanigans had to stay quiet, to form a kind of secret society where they could speak their minds.
America?
Not really!
Here where I live now some five or six years ago I made a comment about something political that leaned toward the right. A bit afterward, one of the people in a supervisory position at the place where I made the comment approached me privately to tell me they (gender purposefully not indicated) agreed with what I said but would I please be careful not to let anyone know and to refrain from outwardly making such comments in the future.
America?
Not really!
Well, so… You can’t put a Trump sticker on your car or a sign out in front of your house without worrying about being harassed and vandalized. You can’t state any opinion other than the current mob-think ridiculousness without putting your job I jeopardy, fear of ostracism or even maybe persecution or prosecution.
America?
Not really!
Not the America I envisioned or once thought I lived in.
By Peter Weiss
Rosie had a glow. Bill smelled of her. They let themselves out of the ladies room carefully and walked back slowly. Bill lit a cigarette and they shared it as they walked.
Neither of them said anything for most of the walk back. Rosie told him she would have liked to have held hands. That was impossible.
Just before they got to the ramp, Rosie, having made sure no one was around, kissed Bill. “Too bad we have to go back,” she said. Then she said, “Don’t say anything, not now, not ever.”
Bill didn’t say anything. He went up the ramp first and stopped by Kalista to get an espresso.
Kalista knew. Bill knew Kalista knew because he sensed it. He felt it. Maybe he just imagined he felt it. She didn’t say anything, at least not right away. She made him the espresso and sat back in her seat. She was sitting not doing anything when Rosie came up the ramp. Rosie did not stop. She went straight on through the double doors and back out into the dining room.
“Any orders?” Bill asked when he went back into the little kitchen.
“One,” Jimmy G said. “You back now?”
Bill shook his head yes.
“Good.” Jimmy G smiled. Without any fanfare, he simply turned and left the kitchen.
Bill, all alone, started the clean up. He began by shutting down the heat to the steam table. Then he started breaking down the food that was out, putting film on the leftover specials and wrapping everything that could be wrapped. He did not work hard, but he worked steadily.
As soon as Rosie had returned, Jo Ann came by the open hearth to say good night. She was the only waitress who had not kissed Bill and she wouldn’t. She blew him a kiss through the open hearth serving window and told him she would see him tomorrow. Bill wished her a safe home, watched as she walked around and past the doorway. He heard the double doors open and close and that was that.
Edelgarde was next, not to leave because she and Rosie always closed together, but to come by the serving window.
“Hey baby,” she said.
“Hey.”
“Rosie got the glow.”
“What glow?”
“The glow.”
Bill smiled. “The Christmas glow?”
“Yeah, that one.”
“Well good for her.”
“I want that glow too.”
“Think of Christmas.”
“Very funny.”
“I have to clean up. And I don’t know where my partner is.”
“What you got to eat?” Edelgarde asked.
“What you want?”
“You know what I want.”
“I have fish and chicken specials left over.”
Nah. I’ll get some of Kalista’s pastry. Seems like you’re not offering anything sweet.”
Bill blew Edelgarde a kiss over the counter. “How’s that?” he asked.
“Not even close,” Edelgarde said. “But I’ll take what I can get.”
“Sure you don’t want some food?”
“I’m good,” Edelgarde said.
“I’ll see you in a bit,” Bill said.
Edelgarde went around and out the double doors. Bill continued with the clean up. He still worked slow and easy. While he was working Caesar came by. He ordered a steak from Bill and Bill took one out and threw it on the grills. Because nothing had been working, the grills were red-hot. The steak sizzled and Bill only waited a moment before he turned it to diamond-mark it. Then he flipped it, and when he did he settled it into a different spot on the grill. Since that spot was red-hot too, he repeated the process, left it a moment then rotated it to diamond-mark it.
Caesar fed, no tables working, no orders and it not looking like any more orders were coming in, Bill went out by Kalista. Jimmy G was just about asleep again, not quite but all but. Edelgarde was eating a pastry and drinking coffee. Rosie was smoking a cigarette and drinking a coffee. Kalista was wrapping up her leftovers and finishing her closing up routine.
Bill lit a cigarette and took a coffee. He walked a bit down the ramp and leaned against the wall. He realized he was tired.
By Peter Weiss
By ten o’clock they were done. Jimmy G and Bill could have started the cleanup then, but they didn’t. The room didn’t close until midnight although Caesar had mentioned maybe closing early. No one had confirmation of an early close as of yet.
Jimmy G had been sitting out by his aunt for most of the night. Now, with nothing at all going on, Bill joined them. He ate a pastry, drank an espresso. He sat smoking a cigarette when he saw Rosie come out through the double doors and head on down the ramp. Part way down the ramp she turned back to him. She gave him a quick nod with her head, the one indicating that he should come along. Then she went on all the way down the ramp.
Bill waited a moment before he got up. He walked over to the bus box and put out his cigarette in one of the dirty ash trays nearby. Then he told Kalista and his partner he’d be back in a bit.
Rosie was waiting out of sight from the ramp and they walked together to the distant employee restrooms.
“It’s Christmas tomorrow,” Rosie said.
“Yup,” said Bill. “Just another day for me cause we’ll be here working. I’m good with that.”
“So am I,” said Rosie. “Not much going on in my life. Being here is okay.”
“I always like making the money. I was broke not too long ago, broke and down and out. Never want to be that way again.”
“I’m okay with money. I like the work. Eddie and me hang out a lot, but that’s about it. I’m not dating anyone, don’t want to. I like it alone and Eddie and me can satisfy each other for now when we need to.”
Rosie looked at Bill and smiled. She didn’t blush and wasn’t shy about what she said. It was all matter-of-fact as it were. She was looking at Bill, he thought, to see if he had any reaction.
“Having enough money is good,” he said.
“I had a husband once. I worked. He spent my money. Never again.” She bumped Bill’s hip with her own. “I hope you stick around a while,” she said.
No one was around. Bill had never seen it this quiet, a time when no matter where you turned or went you didn’t run into at least someone. Everyone was home, or wherever they were, for the holiday, or as many people as could be. Even the banquet chef had told Bill he was running home for an hour or two.
They went into the ladies room together, sure no one had seen them. Rosie flipped the lock shut and there they were. For a moment neither of them knew just what to do do. They stood looking at each other, maybe each waiting for the other to make the first move.
“Have to pee?” Rosie asked.
“Not really. You?”
“Not really, but I will.”
She went to that stall they always used and squatted down to pee. Bill watched but from a distance and with not too much interest. He’d seen her pee before and he’d seen all of her before too.
Then she was put back together and standing before him, her back to the open door of the stall.
“So?” she said.
“So?” he said.
“What’s your Christmas wish?”
“I don’t have any wishes. You?”
“I’d like it sweet,” Rosie said. “I wish we had a bed, but it is what it is. I want it slow and soft and sweet and creamy. Can you do that?”
“I don’t see why not. I’m sure we’ll figure a way.”
“Good.” Rosie took a step toward Bill and then found herself in his arms. They hugged and kissed and hugged and kissed some more.
Because it was slow and nothing was going on out in the dining room, and because his partner had not worked much during the dinner, Bill had time and they didn’t feel rushed. Slow, easy and sweet was definitely doable.
By Peter Weiss
I like to think we do things that are representative of us and of how we are. I like to think that our actions count for something and that our words represent rather than belie our actions.
I like to think that some things stand for other things. I’m talking about bigger metaphors than those like A=B without using like or as. I’m talking about one action standing for a whole group of actions.
Here are a few past examples. One I’ve mentioned before is Harry Reid lying and saying that Mitt Romney had not paid taxes in ten years. It was a lie but Romney could not get out from under it and other mistruths cast by those wonderful Democrat leaders we have.
Later, Mitt Romney having lost, of course, Harry Reid was called out for lying and he said, so what, he lost didn’t he?
That act of lying while pretending to tell the truth has become the overall metaphor in the Democrat playbook.
It would be pointless to go over the past four years because the sides are drawn. Nearly seventy-four million people believe the Democrats stole this election and that says it all. In fact it is a good metaphor for the division in this country.
That said, going back to Harry Reid and the Democrat lying playbook, Joe Biden said he would never take a vaccine developed under Trump and he used that to help his plight in this past election, as a tool. As he said it, as he proclaimed to the people that Trump couldn’t be trusted, he knew all the precautions and measures that had to be taken for a vaccine to be declared usable.
He was lying.
Then he was first to take that vaccine developed under President Trump.
Metaphor for the Democrats, lie as you see fit, even when you know you are lying. And then do as you do.
Metaphor.
Biden is lying all over the place and the media is covering up for him.
We deserve better. We deserve a better metaphor to live by, to be led by, maybe ones established by the likes of Jesus or Martin Luther King Jr.
By Peter Weiss
The first order did not come in until after six. It was a four-top, husband, wife and two kids. Next table was the same, and early on it was all family. People traveled and had to travel for the holidays and lots of people stayed in hotels because they were not visiting family or because it was their preference. Families with little kids had to put the kids to sleep. Maybe anyone they were visiting would be coming to the hotel. Maybe they were feeding the kids before they went wherever it was they were going.
Bill knew his wife would be eating at home with her family and then later on they would be going to her aunt’s house. Bill would miss that but he would drive to her parents’ house to sleep there. Tomorrow before going to work he would drive home to feed the cats. Either someone in his wife’s family would drive her home later in the day or he would pick her up after work and they would go home together.
It was their first Christmas in Cleveland. They didn’t have an established routine as yet.
Jimmy G stayed out of the kitchen mostly. Bill did the cooking and he wasn’t unhappy with this. Rosie and Edelgarde came along from time to time to sneak kisses in the doorway as they held up the mistletoe. Jo Ann was ever herself, business as usual and some very cheerful merry Christmas wishes and thoughts. She was pleasant and happy and openly happy that it was slow and she could get out early.
At one point, when there was nothing working, around quarter-to-eight, Bill went out to Jimmy G and told him to watch things so he could run off to the men’s room. Jimmy G said his usual “Ya,” and went into the kitchen. Bill lit himself a cigarette and slowly, very casually, headed on down the ramp.
He wasn’t surprised when Edelgarde met him. They hadn’t planned this and it wasn’t a pressure thing. They simply shared the cigarette he had lit and walked together to the distant staff bathrooms. They went into the same bathroom, the women’s, laughing and having a good time the whole way.
On their way there, they didn’t run into a single person. No one was in the main kitchen and nothing was working there except for a bare-bones dish-washing crew. The dish-washing area was not on the way to where these bathrooms were.
They did not spend a long time in the bathroom. They kissed a little. They watched each other pee, just because, and they played a little.
“Foreplay,” Edelgarde said.
“Merry Christmas,” Bill said.
“Jimmy isn’t doing much today, is he?”
“Did you expect him to?”
“I don’t expect anything. I do my job and stay as much out everything I can stay out of.”
“Smart,” Bill said. “I get into everything I can get into,” he said.
“You can say that again,” Edelgarde said.
“Course I try to stay out of the politics.”
“Of course.”
They kissed and petted a little more, enough for Bill to stir Edelgarde up pretty well. She laughed and said he could think about her finishing herself herself if he wanted to. He told her that was a great thought, a wonderful image.
They walked back slowly, as leisurely as they’d walked getting there. They didn’t hide being together, were only careful exiting the ladies’ room making sure no one got the view of them inside together.
Back by Kalista, Bill asked her to make him an espresso. Edelgarde helped herself to a pastry and asked Kalista if she could have an espresso. Kalista made two doubles and gave them each one.
Jimmy G was working a few tables. First thing, Bill read the dupes. Then he surveyed what was already working and what was needing to be done. Then he stepped into his place and took up with that which needed doing so as to complete the orders.
