© photo by Daniel DeMarle 4/16/22

We all thought we had time.

Time before the war would start.

Time before you would leave.

Time before the last bell tolled.

We did not know

the poison was already in us.

© words by Daniel DeMarle 4/14/22

there are still a large number of excellent research engines in the world that specialize in books, science, and other smart information.Keep a list of sites you’ve never heard of.

www.refseek.com is an academic resource search engine. More than a billion sources

www.worldcat.org – search within 20,000 global libraries.

https://link.springer.com – access to more than 10 million scientific documents: books, articles,

www.bioline.org.br is a library of published bioscience magazines

http://repec.org – Volunteers from 102 countries collected nearly 4 million publications

www.science.gov is a U.S. government search engine for more than 2200 scientific sites.

www.pdfdrive.com is the largest website to download free PDF books. Claim 225 million+ titles.

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People always ask “What is the meaning of life”   That of course assumes life actually has a meaning.  That can sound harsh, of course, but no one said life had a meaning. I mean does a plant ask “why am I here.” Does an amoeba?  Who knows maybe they do.  The fact is you’re here, and you being here is actually an extremely below-average thing and at the same time the results of probably millions of freaking miracles.  I mean if your great, great, great, great, great, great grandfather was two minutes late he never would have met that woman, and you would never have been here.  Try to replicate that string of chances that ended up with you being here.  So here you are. A freaking miracle.  So after all that, you’re watching a porn video?  Really?  That’s the best you can do.  Well, I can tell you watching a porn video, is probably not the meaning of life. 

I guess in the end, the meaning of life, is whatever you make it. I do know that YOU can totally waste this opportunity.  There is life all around you, are you living yours?

© words by Dan DeMarle 1/4/22

After school shootings, disasters, mass gun casualties or any other trauma you will regularly hear from politicians on one side or the other, and more recently from neighbors and others that now is not the time for politics. You can also hear people in other settings say in a family gathering this is not the time for politics. I still always cringe because of course it is. In America we elect politicians. To do what? Pass laws and regulations. So everything thing involved in that trauma or conversation has to do with politics. Where that coffee came from? How much you paid for it (import/export taxes)? Whether the dairy product you added to it was safe? How many chambers (in some states) were in that gun? Whether there was an effective fire alert system, when it was pulled? Whether the roof came off the building in that tornado, or whether it collapsed in that earthquake all have to do with local building codes. Where the bodies are buried? or could they be cremated? What constituents a casket? All those including whether that car you drove to the funeral had airbags, its’ gas efficiency, whether the road had margins, guard rails, or bike lanes all have to do with elected officials passing those laws and regulations? Literally, if they were passed correctly, that roof would not collapse or be blown off. Those people would either be alive or dead? It all comes back to politics. You not thinking so….. is the problem.

© words by Daniel DeMarle 12/12/21

“By thinking that other people are inferior to oneself. By feeling that one has some innate superiority it may be wealth, or rank, a straight nose, or the portrait of a grandfather by Romney – for there is no end to
the pathetic devices of the human imagination over other people. Hence the enormous importance to a patriarch who has to conquer, who has to rule, of feeling that great numbers of people, half the human race indeed, are by nature inferior to himself. It must indeed be one of the chief sources of his power. But let me turn the light of this observation on to real life, I thought. Does it help to explain some of those psychological puzzles that one notes in the margin of daily life? Does it explain my astonishment the other day when Z, most humane, most modest of men, taking up some book by Rebecca West and reading a passage in it, exclaimed, ‘The arrant feminist! She says that men are snobs!’ The exclamation, to me so surprising for why was Miss West an arrant feminist for making a possibly true if uncomplimentary statement about the other sex? – was not merely the cry of wounded vanity; it was a protest against some infringement of his power to believe in himself. Women have served all these centuries as looking-glasses
possessing the magic and delicious power of reflecting the figure of man at twice its natural size. Without that power probably the earth would still be swamp and jungle. The glories of all our wars would be unknown. We should still be scratching the outlines of deer on the remains of mutton bones and bartering flints for sheep skins or whatever simple ornament took our unsophisticated taste. Supermen and Fingers of Destiny would never have existed. The Tsar and the Kaiser would never have worn crowns or lost them. Whatever may be their use in civilized societies, mirrors are essential to all violent and heroic action. That is why Napoleon and Mussolini both insist so emphatically upon the inferiority of women, for if they were not inferior, they would cease to enlarge. That serves to explain in part the necessity that
women so often are to men. And it serves to explain how restless they are under her criticism; how impossible it is for her to say to them this book is bad, this picture is feeble, or whatever it may be, without giving far more pain and musing far more anger than a man would do who gave the same criticism. For if she begins to tell the truth, the figure in the looking-glass shrinks; his fitness for life is
diminished. How is he to go on giving judgement, civilizing natives, making laws, writing books, dressing up and speechifying at banquets, unless he can see himself at breakfast and at dinner at least twice the size he really is? So I reflected, crumbling my bread and stirring my coffee and now and again looking at the people in the street. The looking-glass vision is of supreme importance because it charges the
vitality; it stimulates the nervous system. Take it away and man may die, like the drug fiend deprived of his cocaine. Under the spell of that illusion, I thought, looking out of the window, half the people on the pavement are striding to work. They put on their hats and coats in the morning under its agreeable rays. They start the day confident, braced, believing themselves desired at Miss Smith’s tea party; they say to
themselves as they go into the room, I am the superior of half the people here, and it is thus that they speak with that self-confidence, that self-assurance, which have had such profound consequences in public life and lead to such curious notes in the margin of the private mind.

― Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own

Funny story – So this weekend stopped by the office and grabbed the mouse to the other work computer, doing computer/security maintenance and updates. Then simply lost the mouse. Poof, it was gone.

Started this morning taking that thin lining off the back of organic grass feed spare ribs, while my wife made a rub and put them in the crockpot to cook. Setting it for 8 hours.

Making ribs for the homeless, families who were evicted, or lost the house or apartment in a house fire. https://www.facebook.com/groups/1780622502209332 Now this population has some adorable babies and toddlers and teens. They deserve some good ribs.

Ride my bike into work. Crazy but very productive day.

About 2 o’clock check Michael Gill ‘s list at Homes for the Homeless to see who else is bringing food. Then I message, Michael, that there doesn’t seem to be enough food, and I don’t have enough ribs.

He asks, because he knows me, he would not ask you, if I can possibly bring more ribs. The ribs have been cooking for about 6 hours by this time.

I, of course, being my mother’s son and a former altar boy say “no!”

Ha, ha, obviously I say yes. He knows me too well.

It’s Monday. Restaurants aren’t open.

But JRibs on State Street is. 400 State Street to be exact.

JRibs https://www.facebook.com/Jribstate is a mini-market, Uhaul rental, and barbecue joint all rolled into one. Foods delish. Call order the extra ribs, be done in about 40 minutes. Great I have time to run an errand.

T-minus 80 minutes.

Jump on my bike – head in the opposite direction to Wegmans. Haven’t shopped there in a year. But those cute kids…. buy bb sauce.

Less than an hour to serving time. The Clock is ticking.

Bike like crazy to the liberty pole. Stop briefly to cheer on protestors. Ride through construction. Get there! T-minus 30 minutes.

The ribs are not ready. Communication problem. Pay $60 to “hold my ribs,” say I’ll be back in my Arnold voice. Think of those kids

Jump on my bike. ….Wait what, why is my bike not riding right? Ah, my back tire is going flat. Oh yeah, construction zone on Main Street.

Ride like mad. Wave to my sister’s house. Get home.

T-minus 20 minutes.

The ribs are done to perfection. The meat is dripping off the bone. You just have to raise the knife, not even touch the knife to the meat, and the meat falls off. Making little noises that say “eat me”

I’m heading out the door. My wife arrives home. Quick embrace as she whispers into my ear. Bring the extra barbeque sauce.

I jump in the car, drive to JRibs. They quickly hand me a delicious smelling container of 20 ribs, maybe 25 I didn’t have time to count.

T-minus, oh oh. Since I don’t have Michael’s phone number, I reinstall the sign of the evil empire, FB, on my phone. I message him.

He says how long. I message back 5 minutes. he says Ok.

4:59 seconds later he meets me with a cart. There are some places, farther away than you might think, that you can get to very quickly from that location on State Street. The car never went faster than the posted speed limit. Scouts honor. Oh yeah, I was never a scout.

We walk in, passing a long line of very polite but probably reasonably hungry waiting people. I say there are more people here than normal. He says they heard there’s was going to be ribs.

Set the food down. Open the doors and 10 minutes later all the food, not just the ribs. All the food is gone. Yes, the babies were there. Yes, they got a little extra – don’t tell anyone, it’s just between you and me.

Drive home, thinking of my sister, Ann DeMarle, and our conversation this weekend. Thinking of karma. of money spent, of blown tires. Why them and not me. There for the grace of something.

Get out of the car. Look over and there in the cup holder…

Is my lost mouse.

Now “homes for the homeless” provides meals for the homeless 6 days a week. Check them out, and sign up to bring a meal. It’s fun, and you might see me. AND those babies are adorable. Also, you DO NOT have to bring ribs. Check out the signup to see what other people bring. My go-to is a huge garden salad. The ribs were just a pre-holiday splurge.

© words by Dan DeMarle 11/15/2021

I just want to say, I totally get it. They can be itchy and hot, too tight or too loose, and things slide around. Do they prevent disease? Well not without extra precaution? Why the hell anyone wears briefs, when they should always wear boxers. Oh, wait, Fool, you thought I was talking about masks!?! Now lets talk about bras.

© words by Daniel DeMarle 8/27/21

In a life that could easily be a major motion picture, the girl who would become Mrs. Lucy Henderson, was born an enslaved person in 1839 in Virginia. She recalls rowing across the River (possibly the Potomac) and bringing dinner to President Lincoln. She was then brought illegally to Brockport and kept as an enslaved person and recalls being tied with ropes. In a daring escape, she jumped on a canal boat and made it Rochester, read the article for more.

She was married to Civil War Veteran George Henderson, who escaped from the Confederate Army to join the Union Army. They lived at 63 Ford Street. Her husband died in 1932 and she died at the age of 102 in 1941.

We often forget that there is an incomparable beauty in being alive.

© words and picture by Dan DeMarle 10/2021