pranks +mimicking = vandalism and stupidity which leads to “Citizen’s arrest”

Hey! HEEEYYYY – –
BARNEY! You made an illegal u-turn YOURSELF!
You’re breakin’ the law, and so I, as a responsible person, need to arrest you!
Citizen’s arrest! Citizen’s arrest!
Gomer Pyle

(1963 episode Andy Griffith Show)

I grew up watching The Andy Griffith Show.
A time when you really didn’t have to worry about what was on television and what
your children would be exposed to.

Despite growing up in an expanding city, as a young girl, I felt a lovely familiarity with the show.
Our world was still somewhat small despite our living the city life.

It was a time when we were urban yet still maintained a rural feel.

Walking down a dirt road with a fishing pole, skipping rocks on a pond did not feel far removed.

One of the funnier episodes, that has remained etched in my mind, was the 1963
episode where Gomer uses his right as a citizen to make a citizen’s arrest against the
inept deputy Barney Fife.

I can still hear Gomer hollering “Citizen’s arrest, Citizen’s arrest” when Barney
made an illegal U-turn in the patrol car.

To this day I so often wish I could slap a blue light on the top of my car,
just like Kojak would do in his unmarked police car, going after the idiots on the street who seem
drawn to my direction like a magnet.

Who loves ya baby?

I’d be screaming “Citizen’s arrest” while nabbing the idiot who was on his cell phone
(which is now against the law in Georgia) while he was driving and weaving over the
yellow line, making a beeline right for my car in the opposite driving direction.
A narrowly missed near head-on encounter because someone was on a cell phone,
driving—when it a violation of the law let alone endangering other drivers.

Sadly my only recourse is to blow the horn and swerve.
Praying the idiot misses me.

Recently, I caught a news story regarding the latest Sandra Bullock Netflix series where
much of the action takes place with the heroine and family being blindfolded.

I watch very little television so this latest show is not something I care to watch…
but the fact that the producers are now having to issue a warning…
“Please do not do this at home” is sadly a sign of today’s pure idiocy.

Who in their right mind thinks mimicking the plot of a movie, like driving blindfolded,
or doing any sort of activities blindfolded is a good idea??

So today I went to get my hair cut.
The gal cutting my hair proceeded to share a story regarding a local
grocery store we both frequent.

She told me a rather unsettling tale while offering a warning.

She told me that she had made her way past the produce section and the meat section
and was now working her way toward the dairy section.
Doing what we all do…zeroing in on our own quests while staying in our own little zone.

It was at this point when she noticed a young teenage male pulling his empty cart
right up beside hers.
He was on his phone while he proceeded to reach into her cart,
grabbing out a bag of oranges which he explained he needed…
and so he was going to simply take hers.

My friend thinking quick on her feet pulled the bag back out of his cart,
replacing it back in her own cart while telling the young man that that was great but
that he would have to go back to produce to get his own bag.

He next told her he was posting her to Youtube.
Her response was…”Oh no you are not!!”

He kept repeating that he was posting since she agreed.
She continued with the “I DO NOT AGREE”

She found a manager and explained what happened.

The manager explained that there seems to be a troubling a new trend of kids
coming to grocery stores while wanting to create “pranks” in order to post
on YouTube.

The kids will head to the dairy section where they grab gallons of milk and smash them
on the floor while filming with their phones in order to upload to Youtube.

Prank or vandalism?

Vandalism I say.

The manager found the kid, along with a friend, who both wanted to know why they
couldn’t record their pranks and why would the manager be throwing them out?

Really???

How about harassing paying customers for starters?

The manager kicks them out of the store and watches as they proceed to make
their way to Target. The store manager calls the Target manager to explain
what’s coming his way.

What about vandalism, the destruction of property, theft, harassment, loitering…

What does any of this have to do with silly pranks—
Nothing.

I’m not a prank fan.
I’m not a fan of fine lines.
I’m a black and white kind of girl.
That it is or it isn’t mentality…

Just so everyone can cash in on the 10 minutes of a million likes of fame.

There is obviously a very fine line that our misguided youth seem to be missing…
One that has me screaming “Citizen’s arrest!!!”

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind,
that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
Romans 12:2

of gods and goddess…

“Am I in earth, in heaven, or in hell?
Sleeping or waking, mad or well-advised?
Known unto these, and to myself disguised?
I’ll say as they say, and persever so,
And in this mist at all adventures go.”
― William Shakespeare, The Comedy of Errors

(statue of Thalia, 2nd century / The Vatican Museum / Rome, Italy)

Thalia, the Greek Goddess of comedy, was the 8th of 9 muses and was one of the
many daughters of the Greek God Zeus.
Most scholars credit Zeus with having 92 children…
so I’m not exactly certain as to where Thalia
rates on the favorite list but seeing that she was in charge of comedy and all things happy,
she was probably a favorite daddy’s girl…
but I digress.

And as the goddess of comedy and poetry, her very name, which translates to flourishing,
referenced that her gifts would flourish through the ages…

However today, I am actually wondering more about the Goddess Moron…

As in I just know that with all those gods and goddesses,
throughout all of the mythology we had to learn in school,
surely there was one named Moron…
Who, might I add, was responsible for stupidity…..
As in, moron being a word that translates to idiot, dunce, blockhead…
as in…
well, I’m sure everyone gets where’s this is all going.

Shakespeare first introduced us to the notion of a comedy of errors with his
play of the same name.
Yet over the years the ‘catch phrase’ came to mean something that was to be
“made amusing by bungling and incompetence.”

So when we say something is a comedy of errors, we mean it is a situation
that is one of idiocy, most likely caused by the Goddess Moron, or at least by a
dunce or idiot acting like a moron who has
demonstrated a certain level of incompetence or bungling…

So during my arduous ride home today on the burgeoning Atlanta interstate system,
the same interstate system that is now bursting at the seams due to the massive interstate closure
as a result of last week’s fire and road collapse,
I found myself pondering the notion of writing a book.

I think it will be entitled, My life, a comedy of errors…
but that title may already be taken…
so….how about…
“Wait and let ME do that…so you can learn from my incompetence”
I’ll use the pen name Goddess Moron.
If Dana Elaine Owens can rename herself Queen Latifah, I, Julie Cook can rename myself
the Goddess Moron.

Makes perfect sense.

And why all this self deprecation you wonder….
Well, I’m so glad you asked…

Have you ever had to go to your town or city’s courthouse to get official paperwork?

A nightmare, I know…..

And if so, you may understand that such a visit is a matter of hoop jumping.

Due to the interstate closures and downtown now being impenetrable, you have to go
to the northern city’s annex.
A building built in the late 60’s that has never had an update or remodeling experience.

You arrive, along with thousands of others who had the same brilliant thought as yourself…
show up on a Thursday cause it seemed like a good idea…

You have to park in an overflow lot that is down by a dumpster and a sea of kudzu
and busted asphalt.
Winded after hiking up from the pawpaw patch,
you enter through a set of double glass doors covered with all sorts of warning signs.

A guard greets you…but….
no one smiles and babies are crying.
There is an odor.
Stale, smokey, bodyish…odors
There are guards and deputies staring you down as you fret that by the way you
are standing could just possibly land you in the pokey.
It’s that serious.

You stand in a long line just to get a ticket to stand in another line and
to be able to simply ask a question…
Asking a question of a person behind a bullet proof glass.
There is a small hole that you can speak through as well as listen through.
You tell her you’re here to probate your dad’s will.
“Oh you’re in the wrong place, you need to be upstairs”

Relieved to leave the sea of waiting humanity, you go outside and walk up the sidewalk
to the “top floor.”
Here another guard tells you to go to the last room down the hall on the right.
The sea of humanity waiting in the hallway is a key clue as to you being in the right spot.

Here is where people buy marriage licenses, gun carry permits as they gather
copies of officially filed identifying papers, probate wills, etc….

You sign in on the sheet sitting on the counter, in the cramped little office,
while the nonplused woman working the other side of the counter tells you to sign in,
go sit down somewhere and not to crowd the counter…
and oh, she’s locking the doors at 1:00 until 2PM for lunch…
You look down at your watch, it’s 12:20.

She processes two of the sea of waiting folks when the magic number 1:00 strikes.
She clears the office telling those waiting inside to go out in the hall and wait with
the others until 2:00.
She locks the door.

You have all your papers in a nice folder sitting on your lap.
You have the check ready for the $200 processing fee.
Your cousin had actually come to meet you and help out but after leaving the first office of
humanity, you thank him, telling him that he is free and needs to go back to work—
because only one from the family should remain in servitude to the system.
You now make nice conversations with your fellow waiters….or is that waitees?

The bell for 2:00PM sounds and the nonplused woman returns and unlocks the door.
She is alone today and mad.
Her supervisor failed to show up for work, leaving her alone to tend to the sea of humanity.
You think that maybe she should now be supervisor.

You hear a few folks fussing, as they walk past you into the adjacent courtroom,
complaining that “if 3 million people voted for her, why did we get him”….
It registers in your brain that you know what they’re talking about and you just
shake your head while you hear another voice screaming in your head that if the man
could just do his job maybe, just maybe,
this whole sea of waiting humanity might not have to wait so long
and that perhaps some of the idiotic bureaucracy could finally be dealt with…
finally allowing this bureaucratic nightmare,
that is morphing into the monster we have created into this thing we call government…
but that screaming voice in your head is now apologizing for digressing…

All of this while new folks file into the cramped office to sign the sheet…
with the nonplused woman behind the counter telling everyone she is closeing the
office at 4PM and everyone will have come back in the morning at 8:30.
A newcomer asks is she’ll pick up where she left off on the list the following day.
“No” she answers flatly, “it’s a new day”…

Finally the sweet little lady, who has been sitting by you this entire time,
has her name called.
She just needed a $10 copy of proof guardianship for her now 22 year old granddaughter
for a college scholarship—
never mind the college has three copies already on file–
she needed another new one…

As you continue waiting, you rather mindlessly and nonchalantly look down,
for the millionth time, at the letter from your lawyer sitting on your lap.
You have the packet she sent to present to the court,
you made certain you had the death certificates,
you had the check ready to be filled out…
you had proof of ID…
but wait….
the will…
where is the will?????

You feel your cheeks burning.
Your stomach flips over.
There is a pain now drilling deep into your temples.
You live an hour and a half away…
You’ve waited almost three hours….
You feel as if you’re having an outer body experience.
You are not allowed to ask any questions until your name is called.
Do you keep sitting, waiting, just to ask if you need the hard copy
of the will in order
to probate the will???

Seems like a no brainer.

You get up from your now well worn chair…
you silently leave your fellow waitees…
making your way back down to the dumpster, busted asphalt, kudzu and your car.

You feel hot tears rolling down your cheeks.
A nice man passes you on the sidewalk…
he sees your tears as he kindly and somewhat knowingly smiles.

When suddenly out of nowhere…
you hear a familiar shrill and overtly heavily ladened southern
laced voice opine…..
“Well fiddledeedee, tomorrow is another day”

Thankful for the wisdom from the southern goddess Scarlett…
you make your way back to the sea of cars on the interstate
ready to come back and do this all over again….another day….

Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.
Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction;
whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life.
Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap
a harvest if we do not give up.
Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people,
especially to those who belong to the family of believers.
Galatians 6:7-10

God is not an idiot

I’ve looked at life from both sides now
From win and lose and still somehow
It’s life’s illusions I recall
I really don’t know life at all…
Lyrics by Joni Mitchell

(Killarney National Park, Lady’s View, Muckrose, Co Kerry, Ireland / Julie Cook / 2015)

Now that’s a header you don’t see everyday…
About God not being an idiot that is…

Yet somewhere lost along the way,
we, as in you and I, as well as the proverbial them, decided that we knew more than Him…
We knew better,
we were wiser,
we were superior
and we were much much smarter.

We went about things our own way.
We gave Him little to no regard when embarking on something new or different
We didn’t opt to seek His counsel, except when we got into some sort of jam or pickle,
When our backs were up against a wall and we felt small and helpless…
then and only then did we seek His wisdom, His help, His advice, His support.

And just as soon as we emerged unscathed from said predicament,
as we marched forward blazing a new trail,
we pushed Him back over to the side, back in the darkened corner,
ignoring that He was…
there,
wiser,
smarter,
greater…

As I stand staring out, surveying the lay of the land,
I don’t care much for what I see.

We’ve made quite the mess of things it seems, both you and I and the proverbial them.
It seems as if most folks are too consumed, too busy, too absorbed
to actually see how messy things have truly become.

It makes one want to stand upon the highest pinnacle shouting outward for all the world to hear…
“Hey you out there…”
“Yes…you….and me and even them…those way over there…”
“STOP!!!!…”
“STOP IT ALL RIGHT NOW!!!”
“Can’t you see what you’re doing, what you’re not doing, what you’ve done???!!!
“This isn’t what He had in mind…none of this….”
“It’s not what He commanded, what He told us to do…”
“That’s why it’s all such a mess…”

Yet sadly it seems no one really is listening or cares to listen because the illusion of what we think we know has sadly become our reality…

Maybe Joni Mitchell realized a glimpse of this back in 1969….