The Poker Game of 1776

July 3, 1776. A tavern across the street from Independence Hall, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

John Adams couldn’t bluff at poker if his life depended on it. Thomas Jefferson knew it. Benjamin Franklin knew it. Old Stone Face, George Washington, sitting across from Adams, knew it.

Ben and Tom folded. Neither of them had any kind of hand to play. But Adams was staying. He didn’t believe Stone Face had a winning hand.

“I call you,” Stone Face said to Adams across the table.

John Adams, a big smile on his face, threw down three aces.  Stone Face threw down his full house, then reached over and pulled the wad of English pound notes toward him.

Adams’ face dropped into a frown. Lost again. Here he was doing the very thing Abby warned him against. Playing poker with Stone Face. Washington always won. Over the course of the last two months, he had just about wiped out all the delegates of the Continental Congress of their cash. But he had done it for a good cause. He needed a new set of false teeth.

Adams said, “I give up. I’m broke. So what are we going to do about John Hancock?”

“We should shoot the son of a bitch,” Stone Face offered. Washington seldom lost his cool but John Hancock had gotten under his skin in a way that British General Howe never did.

Jefferson followed up with, “That’s what we’d do in Virginia.”

“Now, boys,” Ben interjected, “let’s be serious. But not that serious.”

Washington said, “I can’t believe I came back to have to deal with this. My guys at Valley Forge are going to mutiny if we don’t get this settled once and for all.”

“Why don’t we just get him drunk?” Franklin suggested.

Jefferson said,” That is your answer for everything.”

“Just about,” Franklin answered. “How you think I survived that thing with the kite? Remember the old saying, ‘Three strikes you’re out.’ When that lightning bolt hit the kite, I was as drunk as Gulliver must’ve been the day he saw those Lilliputians. The lightning struck me three times, and yet, here I am.”

John Adams knew Hancock too well for that. “He’ll just fall asleep.”

Jefferson was miffed. “All I know is that I am not letting him put those words into the Declaration of Independence.”

Stone Face put in his two pences. “I agree with Tom. I mean, Hancock and his ‘when in the course of human events, it becomes necessary to kick King George’s butt because he is, and ever shall be, a pantywaist’ is a little too much. Even for this Congress. We all don’t like the king but that is a little too much. The British will never take us seriously.”

“Totally destroys the mood,” Jefferson added, “don’t you think?”

The Virginia delegation was unanimous about its approbation against John Hancock. Either the Continental Congress gave Hancock his walking papers or they would be walking. But everybody knew what would happen if Hancock went home. The whole New England bunch would leave with him.

From the beginning, Hancock had been cause for alarm. First he wore that pink outfit. Oh, my gosh. And the chicken costume. It looked like he was trying to out-Elton-John Lady Gaga. Then his proposal that the country use “We are the champions of the world” for its national anthem. It had taken months for John Adams to get his friend to calm down and be reasonable. Now this.

Ben had an idea. “Bet Betsy Ross could get him to go along with the program. After all, she’s his tailor.”

“You know what she’s going to charge?” John Adams inquired.

Stone Face, always a pragmatic man, said, “Yes, but can she get results. When she threatens him, he’ll cry uncle. After all, she’s the one who turned him into a fashionista. Says she has a flair with the silk pajamas”

“Ben,” Adams asked, “have you been able to get her price down? Last I heard she was charging an arm and a leg.”

Jefferson said, “Yeah, just look at Long John Silver.”

“On this one,” Ben said, “she knows she has us over a barrel. She wants the flag concession.”

“Can she get the job done?” Tom asked.

“I believe so,” Franklin said. “She has a long history with Hancock. Something about babysitting with his kids when they were just knee-high-to-a-grasshopper.”

Stone Face was satisfied. “I say we give it to her.”

Jefferson and Adams nodded their heads in agreement. But Franklin was not finished. “In perpetuity.”

“What?” the other three said as a chorus.

“No way are we going to go along with that,” Stone Face said. “John, can’t Abby help in this department?”

“When Hancock puts his mind to a thing,” Adams said, “he puts his mind to a thing. I’m afraid Betsy is our only option. If we want Hancock, we are going to have to give in to her demands.”

“Then,” Stone Face finalized the discussion, “Betsy gets the flag concession in perpetuity. But you tell her that I want a free ‘Don’t Tread On Me’ for each of my Regiments, and according to my specifications.”

John Adams breathed a sigh of relief. He was going to get his revolution, after all. The other three had given him a big thumbs up with their agreement on the Hancock Matter. “So, Tom, looks like you’ll be able to do a press release.”

Jefferson took out his pen and pad and began to write. Then he looked up at the others. “I just realized we have another problem.”

“”What now?” Stone Face was just about fed up with all the back-and-forth going on at the Congress. Why didn’t folks just do what they were told? It would be so much easier.

Jefferson thought so too but he didn’t say anything out loud. “It’s Tom Paine. He’s going to insist on editing my text and publishing it the way he wants.”

Adams was now in the fray. He didn’t like Paine. “Please. No more ‘These are the times that try men’s souls’ crap. God, that man has an ego.”

“Yeah,” Ben agreed. “He gets a fifth down him, and there is no telling what he will write.”

Stone Face had an answer. “We could just draft him. I need a good secretary and he does take shorthand.”

The others smiled. Stone Face once again came to the rescue. Guess that was why folks were calling him “The Father of the Country”.

“Glad we’ve got all that settled,” Stone Face said. “Now I have to go and kick some British hineys.”

“Don’t forget,” Adams requested, “to take a piece out of Cornwallis for me.”

The four men gathered up their things and made for the door, then John Adams said, “I just remembered. Just one more thing.”

“No,” the other three said.

“’Fraid so. It’s Paul Revere. Every time we get ready to attack the British from behind some trees, guerilla style, Paul shows up on his horse. He lets the Brits know where we are by yelling, ‘The Americans are coming. The Americans are coming.’”

A War Widow’s Prayer

Inspired by “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” by Ambrose Bierce

Tomorrow’s Memorial Day when we honor those gave their lives for our country. And rightly so we honor those souls. The last year or so, I’ve been thinking of the families of those who gave their lives for our country. They too should be honored for we owe them so much. 

Lord.

I shot a Yankee today.  I know it ain’t right to kill a man. That’s what the Commandments say. I had no say in the matter. He come snooping around. Wanting to know where Peyton was. I didn’t dare tell him Peyton was off fighting Yankees down at the bridge.

Little Eli, he told the Blue Coat to git. The man was having none of that. He just laughed and laughed like he knew something we didn’t. He knocked my boy out of his way and come at me, looking like he had something dreadful on his mind.

I pulled that pistol Peyton done give me out of my apron. It was hard cocking that gun but I done it. I shot that Yankee in the face and killed him.

My oldest, Noah, was out plowing the field. He heard the shot and come running into the house and seed the dead man, lying on the floor. He rolled the Yankee’s body onto the rug I braided last winter, rolled that red rug up, and tied that rug around the body real tight. Then that boy, only thirteen, threw the bundle onto his shoulders. With that body of his, all tall and muscular like his granddaddy, he toted the bundle out to the back of the house. I stood there on the back porch and watched my boy bury that Yankee and cover the grave so there’s no trace.

He said to me that we got to speak some words over the man. Ain’t right to leave a man in his grave without some words, no matter how mean he was, or how much he’s out to do the bad things this Yankee had on his mind, So that was what we did. We stood over that grave and my boy said them words just like the preacher would’ve. Noah made me so proud, him taking charge and all.

About the time Noah got hisself cleaned up, this Yankee lieutenant come riding into our yard. He was real spit and polish sittin’ on the back of a mighty fine horse. He calls down to me, “Ma’am, we hung your husband. He’s on that wagon there. Where you want him?”

I never cried. I would not cry. I would not wring my hands. I would not grieve. I would not let that Blue Coat of a lieutenant see me weak like he was expecting. I give Mr. Spit-and-Polish directions to the little church down the way. Then me and the boys followed that wagon to the church. Preacher tried to comfort me, and I was comforted best I could be. It was best to get the burying over with, and that’s what we done. We sent Peyton on to You, Lord. I just want You to know that Peyton was a good man. The best man I ever knowed. And I’m wanting You to take good care of him, y’hear. I’ll be much obliged if You do.

There’s just me and my two boys left now. That Blue Coat lieutenant told us to gather our things and git. We couldn’t stay at the house. The Yankees aimed to burn the house and the barn down, and the crops too. He give us no choice but to hitch up our wagon with the mule. So we’re going now.

Oh, Lord, strengthen me for the road ahead in these dark times. Lead this husbandless woman with her two fatherless boys safely through the wilderness and to the promised land of my sister’s house.

I got to go for now. Night will be upon us soon. May light return on the morrow, and may Your grace light all our tomorrows.

Amen.

A Swashbuckling Fool

Once upon a time, there was a book and a movie and then another movie and even another movie called The Three Musketeers. Why such popularity? They were superheroes seventeenth century style.

“If you are going to swash your buckle, why not swash it for the Musketeers,” D’Artagnan advised his son. That is exactly what D’Artagnan Junior did. It was his heart’s desire to go off and become the latest in a long line of swashbuckling D’Artagnans to swash their buckles for the Musketeers.

On his way to becoming a full-fledged swashbuckling master of the Musketeer kind, he fought beaucoup number of fights, lost his virginity and had three or four duels. With Musketeers, of course. Only a Musketeer could duel a duel. Otherwise it was not much of a duel. It was a rout. No one else in all of France had enough umph to duel. Only a Musketeer had the duelling umph. ‘Cause that was what Musketeers had for breakfast. Umph with milk and a large mug of black coffee.

Since Musketeers hung their hats in Paris, it was off to Paree for our young D’Artagnan. In case your French ain’t so good, D’Artagnan means “From Artagnan”. In other words, he was from Gascony in Southern France down around Spain. It was a nice enough place to grow up. But if you wanted to be a Musketeer swashbuckler, Paree was the place to be.

That in itself is enough to get an ambitious young fellow into trouble. After all, he was a country bumpkin who dressed country-bumpkinish and rode a country-bumpkinish horse. Even if he did not look the part, he sure sounded like a hick. He would have benefitted from Madame Suzette’s Speak-Like-A-Parisian. And she, being partial to young swashbucklers, would have taught him the latest dance craze, the minuet.

But no, our young friend was of the impatient breed. Like the old saying goes, “when you gotta go, you gotta go.” D’Artagnan just had to go. To Paree, that is. So he was off to the Emerald City. Only they did not call it the Emerald City. It was The City of Lights. That’s ’cause it was well-lit four seasons a year just like Camelot by command of the king.

In case you have a hankering for some swashbuckling your own self, remember to take some advice from a very wise man. “Use the Force, Luke, use the Force.” Or is that the Farce? I never can remember.

What swashbuckler do you think lives up to the name “swashbuckler”?

George Washington Slept There, And So Did A Few Others

When GW, and I am not talking Bush here, when GW moved into the White House, do you know the first thing he asked the Secret Service? “Where’s the cherry trees? I think I need another set of teeth.”

When John Adams moved into the White House, he tried to find the cherry trees.

When Tommy Jefferson moved into the White House, the first thing he did was check out the female staff…I mean, books.

When Jimmy Madison moved into the White House, his wife, Dolley, went to decoratin’. She was nowhere pleased with Abby Adams’ choice in furniture. “That Franklin stove has to go.”

When Jim Monroe moved into the White House, he asked that booze be named after him. That is why we have a fifth. (He was the fifth President, you know.)

When John Quincy Adams moved into the White House, he requested that folks quit calling him Quince. ‘Course nobody listened. Nobody ever listened to him.

When Andy Jackson moved into the White House, the first thing he went for was the booze…and the dueling pistols.

When Martin Van Buren moved into the White House, he put in a cabinet in the kitchen.

When Tippecanoe moved into the White House, he died.

When John Tyler moved into the White House, he moved Texas in too.

When Jimmy Polk moved into the White House, the first thing he looked at was the maps. He wanted a country to invade, and Canada was out of the question.

When Zack Taylor moved into the White House, he died too. Need I say more?

When Milliard Fillmore  moved into the White House, he didn’t stay. He was moved out after one term.

When Franklin Pierce moved into the White House, people kept forgetting his name. When he passed them in the hall, his staffers would say, “Oh, there goes old what’s his name.”

When James Buchanan moved into the White House, he still couldn’t find a wife. Or an intern, for that matter.

When Abe moved into the White House, he asked about the Lincoln bedroom. He had heard so much about it. Then he discovered that the bed was too short.

When Andy Johnson moved into the White House, he became the first Johnson to move into the White House.

When General Grant moved into the White House, he made sure the typewriters had an S. After all, it was his middle initial. He didn’t want the country to confuse him with Ulysses W. Grant.

When Rutherford B. Hayes moved into the White House, he left saying, “You won’t have Rutherford B. Hayes to kick around anymore.”

When James A. Garfield moved into the White House, well, he didn’t stay.

When Ben Harrison moved into the White House, he sang, “Here a billion. There a billion. Everywhere a billion.”

When Grover Cleveland moved into the White House, he said, “I’m back. Did you miss me?”

When William McKinley moved into the White House, he said, “Send in Teddy. He’ll take San Juan Hill.”

When Teddy Roosevelt moved into the White House, he brought that big stick he’d been talking about.

When Willie Taft moved into the White House, he threw his weight around.

When Woodrow Wilson moved into the White House, he retired the big stick and started talking. He kept making his point. In fact, he made it fourteen times.

When Warren G. Harding moved into the White House, he dated his secretary. And her secretary too. He is also famous for saying, “Who put the pineapple juice in my pineapple juice?”

When Calvin Coolidge moved into the White House, he quit talking.

When Herbert Hoover moved into the White House, he got depressed.

When FDR moved into the White House, he decided to stay.

When Harry Truman moved into the White House, he charged everybody a buck to see him. After all, the buck stopped with him.

When I-Like-Ike moved into the White House, he told Dick Nixon, “There’s only room here for one President and I am it.”

When JFK moved into the White House, so did Jackie.

When LBJ moved into the White House, so did his hound dawg.

When Dick Nixon moved into the White House, he asked the Secret Service, “Where can I buy some tape? Preferably eighteen minutes long.”

When Gerald Ford moved into the White House, he tripped.

When Jimmy Carter moved into the White House, toothpaste sales went sky high.

When Ronnie Reagan moved into the White House, he congratulated himself on getting back into show business.

When George H. W. Bush moved into the White House, the broccoli moved out.

When Bill Clinton moved into the White House, he started the internship program. “Give a girl a good start in life,” he said.

When George W. Bush moved into the White House, he put in a direct phone line to God.

When Barack Obama moved into the White House, he discovered that George Bush had taken out the phone line to God and moved it to Texas. Rick Perry needed it.

When Mitt Romney moved into the White House, oh, that’s right, he didn’t move into the White House. After all, he was part of that 99% of people who ran for President and lost.

When Donald Trump moved into the White House, he moved the darn thing down to Mara-a-Lago in Florida.

When Joe Biden moved into the White House, he forgot to stand up when the White House Band played “Hail to the Chief.” He thought they were playing it for somebody else. After all, he’d lost all them other times he ran.

Happy President’s Day everybody.

The Rediscovery of Sex

I was watching an old 1930s movie recently. A couple got married. They never had a honeymoon. The husband carried his blushing bride over the threshold, dropped her in the living room, then went off to work. The wife went shopping.

In the one scene in the bedroom, there were twin beds. Both husband and wife wore pajamas. They gave each other a good night smooch, then each crawled into their twin bed and went off to zzzz-land. No time in the movie did the couple even hint at the s-word.

Since movies are a very good reflection of real life, none of the thirties romances had sexual activity. If couples were having sex, they kept it on the q.t. Guess that was why it was called the Great Depression.

It got me thinking. How did they avoid sex? I mean, these days sex is everywhere. It’s on magazine covers. It’s in the ads. It’s in the movies. It’s on tv. It’s in the music. It’s even on the evening news. We can’t seem to get enough of it. So just how did our forefolks avoid sex? Why would they want to anyway? Why did it take a World War to bring back sex?

Big questions. Recently Uncle Bardie came across an ancient tome called  “The Real Kinsey Report” that explained much that has been hidden from history. Lord Byron was one of the last two people in England in the Nineteenth Century to enjoy a ménage à duet, his female partner à duet being the other people. As the famed Lord was making a strategic withdrawal, Queen Victoria and Prince Albert were engaged in hanky panky on the HMS Queen Mary. The thing is there was more hanky than panky.

Vickie and Bertie were off on their honeymoon. Of course, you do know that the origin of the word “honeymoon” was Anglo Saxon for “tiddlywinks”.  As soon as Bertie showed his blushing bride his tiddly and she showed him her winkie, they both realized this would never do. She said, “Ewwww.” And she meant it. He said, “Yech.” And he meant it. That was the end of sex as our forefathers and foremothers knew it. The end of foreplay. And afterplay too.

They returned to Buckingham Palace and declared that there was to be no more sex in the land. To make sure that their command was obeyed, they proclaimed a proclamation and they decreed a decree. Every female over the age of twelve not only had to wear a girdle. She had to wear a corset, even when she went to bed. Especially when she went to bed.

Unlike Prohibition, the new regime of non-coitus dilecti was widely popular. The Germans loved it. The Russians loved it. The Chinese loved it. The Greeks loved it. The Americans loved it. The Italians, not so much. Only the French resisted. And the Canadians who were half French anyway. The Canadians just shook their heads and thought, “Are they crazy? How are we to keep warm, eh?”

Late in the century, the French came around. We all know the details. It was the Albert Dufus Affair. Seems that A D was messing around with the Can-Can. Needless to say, it was uncanny how candid the Can-Can can.

The Can-adians never came around. Oh, sure. They too had a coitus interruptus with the Yukon Gold Rush. It was a brief run. Why have all that gold and not have anything to spend it on? So it was soon back to the business of coitus-ing all over the place. Like they say, nobody can the way a Can-adian can-can. Canada, what a country.

Since men and women didn’t make whoopee during the Great Sex Out, they didn’t need to smell good either. So no one took a bath.

Talk about Weather Changes and Global Warming. For almost one hundred years, Earth was bathed in a certain smell. Scientists blamed it on the Industrial Revolution. The truth is it came from the lack of bathing. The smell almost destroyed the ozone layer. The planet was carbon dioxiding all over the place.

For ten years after the Anti-Fornication Act of 1840, there were no babies born. “Why no babies?” the Victorians queried. Everybody liked babies. Oh, sure. There was the poop. Good thing the babies outgrew that. Not the pooping. Changing the diapers they pooped in.

The Victorians did not equate pregnancy with sex. They believed babies were delivered by storks. But there wasn’t a shortage of storks. So. Why no bambinos? It just wasn’t natural. Before they could say, “We’re really screwed,” a solution appeared on the horizon. It came from a most unusual source.

The North Pole. And it was not Santa Claus who presented a solution. Everybody presumed it was Dr. Livingston. But Dr. Livingston was deep in the heart of Africa presuming.

It seems that the Sir Rutherford Rutherford returned from his Great Balloon Exploration into Wild Blue Yonders of the Outer Atmosphere with an amazing artifact. You’ve heard of the iPod. He brought back an ePod.

A what? Yes, you heard me right. I said an Extraterrestrial Pod, known as an ePod. Extraterrestrials were born from ePods and it had been going on for centuries.

When ePods were first introduced to the rest of the planet, people were very skeptical. Some even afraid. Here is some footage taken at one of the first Royal Society meetings:

Soon the Victorians calmed down and realized this was the answer to a prayer. No sex and beaucoup babies. Before you knew it, most families were raising a crop of ePods in their backyards.

There were those who resisted like Abraham Lincoln. “Fourscore and seven years ago” was not about the Declaration of Independence. Abe was talking about the wild sexcapades our forefolks had back in the Olden Days. The Boston Tea Party was a protest, not over a tax on tea, but a tax on condoms.

I bet you thought Manifest Destiny was about increasing the size of the United States westward. It was not. It was about spreading the ePod Gospel. Custer and his Cavalry were taking a wagonload of ePods into Indian country. Sitting Bull had seen the future and he wanted none of it. It was every Indian’s right to have babies the organic way. None of that genetically modified babies for the Sioux.

Despite the resistance, the ePods became the way children came into this world by the beginning of the twentieth century. Oh sure, there were rebels without a cause like D. H. Lawrence and his Lady Chatterley. FDR was rumored to have said to Eleanor on their first night as a married couple, “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.”

This was the way of things until World War II. The War destroyed most of the ePods. When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, they wiped out the ePod Supply of the entire United States. FDR wasn’t kidding when he spoke before Congress and said, “This is a Day that will live in Infamy.” He really meant it. By the end of the war, the Atom Bomb radiated the few ePods left.

For the next few years, the world was in despair. What to do? What to do? The Korean War was fought because the Allies believed the North Koreans were hoarding ePods. They weren’t. So the Allies lost interest and declared a Truce.

No one seemed to know what to do. Then Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr parted the waters.

Burt and Debbie showed us the way. Sex was back. And this time it was here to stay.

At least, till another ePod outbreak.