My Credo 10/17/21

 CREDO 

October 17, 2021

Don Rogers

The first thing I did when asked to give my Credo was to go back and find the one I gave two years ago, before the Covid pandemic.

If your memory is no better than mine, I could have reread the same one, and probably no one would have noticed. But I noticed that I missed a lot of pertinent parts of my life and my credo.

I made no mention of my wife and her years of dementia and death in July of 2018. It was too close to mention at that time, and I might have not been able to say the words aloud without tears. It’s still hard.

Very briefly, I was raised Seventh-day Adventist, and educated in church schools through one year of college, at Walla Walla University, in the state of Washington. 

I left that religion when I was eighteen, and studied many others, trying to find the true church. I studied the Branch Davidians, Jehovah’s Witness, the Mormon church, Armstrong’s Worldwide Church of God, and others.

I still retain a strong interest in Biblical history, especially the first four hundred years of the Christian church. I read extensively and write a blog online about some of my findings now and then.

This is in spite of my study of Buddhism, which is the basis of my beliefs and ethics now. I studied with Buddhist priests at a temple in Naha, Okinawa, along with a couple of Christian buddies of mine in the US Army with me.

My wife Carolyn and I enjoyed a very happy marriage for 49 years together, living in several states, including California, Colorado, Nevada, and lastly, Oklahoma, where she was born and raised.

From the first year we were together, we made square dancing our social outlet, and danced at national festivals in Anaheim, CA, Portland, OR, and Oklahoma City twice. Even as Alzheimer’s took away her memory, she still loved to dance, and when Featherstone Assisted Care Home had special musical performers put on shows for the residents, we danced the night away. Her feet never forgot.

We also loved the outdoors and nature, camping in the forest campgrounds, and hiking mountain trails in Yosemite and the Sequoia big trees in Calaveras county, CA.

We moved to Nevada in 1981, and soon found that the towns were about 70-80 miles apart. Travel took forever, even though the highways were free and fast. Carolyn urged me to go and get my pilot’s license, which she knew was a dream of mine, so I took lessons and got my license in 1985.

We flew from Winnemucca, Nevada, to Durant, Oklahoma, many times in the next few years for her family reunions, seeing some spectacular sights as we flew cross country. Monument Valley in Utah especially stands out as awe inspiring from the air.

We also flew back from a symphonic concert in Elko, NV, one December morning at about 1:00 AM and found ourselves in a meteor shower. At 10,000 feet altitude there are a lot more meteors visible, and they were all coming from behind us and passing by our wings on both sides. All we could do was watch in silence and wonder.

Much of our life was lived by the Buddhist principle of impermanence. Nothing lasts forever, and everything changes. If we wanted to do something, to enjoy living, to not miss out on an experience, it was important to do it now, or as soon as possible. Tomorrow is not promised, and life must be lived in the present.

I believe a successful life must be an active life, becoming involved in the lives of those around us, including family, society, and even politics. I was a founding member of the Libertarian party, although I left that party later.

I became heavily involved in the Democratic Party of Nevada during Barack Obama’s run at the Presidency in 2008. I was elected Chairman of the Democratic Party in Humboldt County and assisted in the first caucuses in that state, helping elect Obama in Nevada. Since that time I have volunteered to work at polling places during elections, six times in Nevada, and four elections since I moved to Oklahoma. I was an Inspector for Precinct 27 last Tuesday for the Bryan County sales tax vote.

While my wife was declining with Alzheimer’s I wrote constantly. I have been a writer since I was young, and it provides a way to unload worries and sorrows from my mind during the day so I can sleep at night.

Our daughter Darlene moved up to Oklahoma to help me take care of her mother during the two years she lived at Featherstone Assisted Care Home. We were there everyday to bring her ice cream and candy, take her on outings to Lake Texoma or the city park on Washington St. in Durant. We walked with her when she got restless and walked the halls of the building, and as she became paralyzed we pushed her around in the wheelchair. We fed her as she became too weak to feed herself. We both held her hands as she died.

Since this Covid pandemic left me stuck at the house for much of last year, I have been able to assemble the myriad of blog posts, Facebook posts, and other notes I had written into a manuscript - a compilation, actually. I could not do it when the pain of losing her was fresh in my mind.

Since our life was spent making memories for each other, it was a cruel blow to find that she was losing those memories. I titled the book “The Memories are All Mine Now.” I tried to find a publisher, but got scammed by some shady outfit that just wanted my money. So I bought a good printer and self published it for close friends and relatives.

I have found a home in this Unitarian Universalist church, and appreciate the love, community, and nonjudgemental attitude about my Buddhist ways.  My work with the Audio/Video team has been challenging but rewarding. I just keep learning more every week. When I die, I’ll be an A/V expert! 

I’ll finish with a quote from the Tibetan leader, the Dalai Lama, “Whether you believe in God or not does not matter so much, whether you believe in Buddha or not does not matter so much: as a Buddhist, whether you believe in reincarnation or not does not matter so much.

You must lead a good life. And a good life does not mean just good food, good clothes, good shelter. These are not sufficient.

A good motivation is what is needed: compassion, without dogmatism, without complicated philosophy: Just understanding that others are human brothers and sisters and respecting their rights and human dignity.”

< Short speech given at the Red River Unitarian Universalist Church on Oct. 17, 2021 >

Playing in the Street

 It was a still, hot afternoon as I drove home from my church in Texas, a few miles south of my home in Oklahoma. I had the air conditioning turned up high to get the interior of the vehicle cooled off to comfortable level.

As I was driving through an old residential area, I came to a stop sign. I applied the brakes and stopped, looking both ways past the trees and bushes for cars crossing in front of me. However, this day I saw no cars.

What I saw was worse. At first I was confused, then I was shocked into sadness. A young woman was standing in the middle of the road about two houses down on the right. She wasn’t doing anything, just standing there, looking up and down the street.

A second later I noticed a small child, just a baby actually, playing at her feet in a chuckhole in the old cracked pavement. A trickle of water from somewhere, maybe a leaky pipe nearby, had filled the crater in the road, and the child was splashing and enjoying relief from the heat. 

I was raised in poverty by a single mother, but this was poverty far beyond anything I ever saw. Obviously their house had no air conditioning, and maybe the water was turned off until they could raise enough money to pay the water bill and get it turned back on. This mother needed to keep her daughter safe in the heat, and so she did it the only way she could figure out how.

I didn’t stay stopped long. I drove on by and I had a bit of trouble seeing for a mile or so. I felt immense sadness and more than a little guilt that I could be living a comfortable life in retirement, while such abject poverty was so near to me. 

I think sometimes my empathy and compassion cause me more pain and suffering than I should have. On the other hand, the Buddha promised that life is suffering, and the goal of life is to study constantly to find wisdom and understanding, which will lead to less suffering and peace in your life. 

I can’t get the picture out of my mind. It’s going to be a long night, I fear.

Five Ways You're Living under Socialism

 Five ways you are living under socialism.

Fire fighters:

You pay your taxes, and when a fire occurs at your house, they come and put it out. There are no charges, and they don’t send you a bill.

If the fire department were capitalist, you would have to give them your credit card or cash before they turned on the hoses.

Police:

You pay your taxes, and if someone breaks into your house you call them and they arrest the intruder. You hope. Once again there are no charges and they don’t send you a bill.

Some rich people hire their own police security people, and pay their wages and expenses. That’s capitalism, if you can afford it.

Roads and streets:

You buy gasoline and pay the tax per gallon, and then you can drive on any public road or street without having to pay tolls for the miles you drive.

Some roads and bridges are privatized and funded by paying a fee for each use. That is capitalism, not socialism, and those of us on a fixed income go out of our way to drive on other roads to avoid those fees, if possible.

Schools:

In the US grades 1-12 are socialized. You pay your taxes and your children get an education in a public school. No tuition is charged, but because we are not funding our public schools sufficiently, you might have to go to a bake sale. Amazing to me, coming from a state where fireworks are illegal, many schools here in Oklahoma fundraise by selling fireworks. I love it!

There are capitalistic private and parochial schools, which you must pay for per each child, if you can afford it. Rich kids all go to private schools, poor kids get poor schools, where there may not be much education at all. 

Retirement:

Before 1935, if you didn’t save enough for retirement, (or lost it in the stock market crash), when you got too old or sick to work, you went to the “poor farm” or moved down by the river and stole or begged for a living until you died. President Franklin Roosevelt and Frances Perkins started the Social Security Administration. It’s pure socialism - you pay your taxes all the years when you are working, and then you are payed back when you retire. 

Wall Street capitalists are not allowed to plunder the funds, and it is as safe as the US government. It keeps millions of seniors out of dire poverty, and allows most to live without having to move back in with their children.

Health care:

NOT socialism, yet. If you’re over 65 years old, there is Medicare, which covers 80%, but then if you want it all covered you must pay for private supplemental insurance policies. So everyone must pay insurance premiums, deductibles, copays, and excluded drugs, etc, at whatever cost the corporations charge. 

Hospitals, drug companies, and medical insurers all pay millions every year to buy the votes of our “representatives” to make sure the laws are not changed to allow full 100% Medicare for All. The US is the only nation where medical care is still dispensed on an extortion basis. It could be described as “Pay what we say or Die” medical care.

When I lived in Nevada, one of my maintenance drugs price rose to over $900 bucks a month. Luckily Nevada has a law that allows people to order drugs from Canada, which has socialized, regulated medical care. I was able to import my particular drug for $135 dollars. 

Then I moved to Oklahoma. When I tried to order more of my drug, Canada informed me that Oklahoma has a law prohibiting any drug imports from Canada, under the penalties for drug trafficking. 

So far, without my immunosuppressant drug, I am in remission. Hoping it stays that way.

I enjoy the balmy weather in Oklahoma. I wish Canada weren’t so damn cold!