Sunday,Aug 10 2008, 04:45:14 AMBlack-Barty Winkum - A Boy With a Funny Name

Black-Barty Winkum:

A Boy with a Funny Name.

Clifford Latta

His name was Black-Barty Winkum with a hyphen between the Black and the Barty. When the teacher would call his name she would say, "Black-Barty Winkum" and the kids would always laugh when they heard it for the first time and Black-Barty would grin and raise his hand and say, "Here, mam" for, after all, that was his name. When he was very young , before he started going to school, his dad had told him that he had to wait a little longer to hear the story of how he got his name. He did tell him that he and his mom gave the name a lot of consideration before giving it to him and had finally decided that it was the right name for him and so he became, from a new baby with no name, a new baby with the name "Black-Barty" with a hyphen.

One day, when Black-Barty, his dad, his mom and his sister, Mary Jay-June (his sister's name was another story) were at the beach making a wonderful sand castle just out of the reach of the waves, Black-Barty said, "Dad, it's time for you to tell me how I got my name."

The family stopped their sand castle building. The story about Black-Barty's name was far more important than a sand castle no matter how nice or how big it was. The  sand castle was, after all, just a temporary bit of family fun...while his name was with him from the beginning of his life and would be with him until the end.

The family sat down on a couple of large pieces of drift wood. His dad paused for a long moment looking at each member of his family. He smiled his famous smile, the smile with the built in 'wink'. Everything was sort of a joke to his dad and he was known for his keen sense of humor and his love for life. Some of the family's friends thought his dad acted too young, that he acted like a teenager; he'd always do kid stuff like riding his bike to fast or skating too fast at the skating rink; he'd ride a skate board and do it with a certain grow-up flair. The kids really liked him. "Well," he started, "It was this way, Black-Barty. You weren't born yet and we were having a wonderful, big block party baby shower for your mom...a traditional block party with everyone in the neighborhood invited. We put up barricades so cars couldn't drive down our street; we even had a band. Your mom was very pregnant with you; as a matter of fact, Black-Barty, you were born the very next morning. Oh yeah, it was also a costume party. Those who wanted to dress up could and those who didn't want to didn't have to. You know, very casual. We did, however, give a prize to the Best Costume." Dad looked over at mom and smiled a big smile just for her. "Remember, honey, Joe came as a roll of toilet paper and Douglas came as a note pad.holder." They both laughed. Mom said, "Everyone was writing stuff on the note books he had hanging all over his body." Dad laughed even louder, "Who was that who came as a hamburger?" Mom laughed, "Mr. Simson;" she said. "He was a burger with all the trimmings." She took dad's hand, "Remember, sweety, food costumes were big at that party. If I remember correctly we had a hot dog, a pizza and, what was it, a muffin?" "Yep," dad said, "It was a muffin." Dad looked at Black-Barty. "Here's where your name starts to come into the picture. The costume we all thought was the greatest was worn by a friend of yours and one of my very closest friends, uncle John. He came as Black Bart the old cowboy outlaw and he looked the part. He hadn't shaved for several days and he had a patch over one eye; he was wearing black leather clothes and he had two six-shooters strapped to his hips. He had big, black cowboy boots with studs in them. that looked almost like diamonds. Silver flashed from his ornate belt. He had a wonderful black horse that he'd borrowed from a friend of his who rode the horse in the circus and at the fairs, a trained horse with a magnificent leather saddle and everyone stopped to look at uncle John and the horse. The hamburger stopped to look; the pizza looked; the hot-dog looked and the roll of toilet paper and note books looked, too. Everyone stopped to look at Black Bart astride his majestic horse.

"Well, later that night we were sitting around talking and I said, 'Black Bart, are you enjoying our block party?' And he said, 'Well, I'd rather call it a Black Bart Party,' and I said, 'Well it wouldn't really be a party, it would be a Barty.' And he said, 'Yeah, a Black Bart Barty,' and I said, 'A Black Bart Winkum Barty,' and he said, with a wink, 'Good name for your kid.' So, son, don't blame me; you talk to your uncle John about it; he's the one that came up with the idea but I'll tell you the truth, I thought it was down right cute, Black-Barty Winkum; it has a built in smile. You may not find it overly amusing right now, son, but I think later in your life you'll look back and think, "Thanks uncle John for the really cool name. What a fun time I've had with it. I've met a lot of people, you know, actually stopped and talked with them because of my name and my name has brought a lot of smiles into the world...and when I look back on it, it wasn't altogether unpleasant. If I had of been named Richard or Bob or Bill, all fine names, I wouldn't have met as many people or heard as many stories or shared as many winks with folks as they smiled and said, 'Black-Barty Winkum...now I LIKE that name.' Anyway, my boy, I think you will have to wait until your a little older to decide what you think of your name."

As the years passed Black-Barty realized that his name had opened many doors and been responsible for the first words that would lead to good friendships and given him the opportunity to talk to a potential employer which would give him an increased chance of getting the job he wanted. Sometimes when someone said his name out loud like, "How's it going, Black-Barty Winkum?" People would stop and smile and sometimes he'd tell the story of how he got his name and by the time the story was told he'd have new friends and, maybe, a new girl friend or a new job. It was all quite exciting and it turned out to be quite a positive thing being called Black-Barty Winkum.

Kids, the moral of this story is: We have to go with what we have. Like in a card game; you get dealt a hand of cards and you have to play them the best way you can. And, sometimes during a card game, the cards will start to look more attractive and you'll say, "Now these aren't bad cards at all."

The End

 

Sunday,Aug 10 2008, 04:26:32 AMfThe Origin of Everything Human

The Origin of Everything Human

By Clifford Latta 07-22-08

They hadn't yet become gregarious. He stalked the night in pursuit of subsistence and, if able to take a female by surprise, propagate the species not from some grand intent but as a byproduct of pervasive lust.

Two days before he had smashed the head of a small, furry animal with a lucky rock shot. It had been his first 'blood' food in many days. He had ripped it open, first drinking down the hot blood as it spilled from open places in the fur, then came the soft entrails filled with a variety of textures, smells and tastes. None of those things mattered. All that mattered was getting as much of the furry creature inside of his stomach as possible. Toward the end of his meal he started to feel something akin to satisfaction...a sort of awareness that a need had been resolved for the moment; not unlike his occasional rutting with mostly unwilling females of his species. He was naked. He had no tools or weapons other than sharpened sticks and stones. Fire was a long way in the future. He was the beginning of a species that would one day conquer the world, enslave the planet on which he was evolving and walk on the moon and, too, he would destroy millions of people without hardly trying.

His meal finished, he sucked the last blood from the tattered, inedible skin on which the fur was so tightly fixed, twisted the small ball of skin and fur for the last few, precious drops of juices and, with a grunt, tossed what was left of the small, furry creature into the bushes.

A week passed and he was able to only find a rotting bit of flesh left from some other animals kill; not enough to fill his hunger but enough to make him remember his last blood meal...the tattered bit of skin and fur tossed into the bushes. He didn't yet have a mind that would allow for speculation but deep inside the evolving creature was the beginning of a concept: Hope. Perhaps, caught in that bit of skin and fur was a missed shred of blood food; perhaps, with an even tighter 'twist' a few drops of juice could be extracted; perhaps, in that discarded remnants of a past meal there would be some substance.

The substance that would eventually be wrung from that bit of fur and skin would shape the world.

He was drooling when he finally found the discarded bit of fur and skin. His initial vague hope had become an expectation. He would find some more juice, a bit of flesh, a reward for his memory and search.

The fur had rotted and been eaten, by small creatures evolved to take advantage of such meals, from the skin. All that was left was the skin and it had dried wrapped around several branches of a small bush. He twisted his precious find until it broke loose tightly holding the branches in place. In places it was transparent and he could see the branches and his hand through the skin. It was also very strong and as he tried to chew it the branches imbedded in the twisted, dry rawhide gouged at his nose and eyes. He broke the branches where they protruded from the rawhide but the parts of the branches that were caught 'inside' the twists of dried skin, held fast and couldn't be dislodged. Almost immediately his hope for juice disappeared. There was no blood food value in his handful of skin and branches. He threw the twisted lump to the ground and started to stumble away. One of the larger sticks in the skin stuck him in his ankle as he kicked at it.

Bending over he grunted and groaned as he pawed at the trickle of blood that ran from the small puncture wound. It wasn't his habit to draw his own blood for a meal but should he injure himself and his fluids leak out he would consume all that was made available by the wound. On several occasions, with deep gashes caused by the events of his life, there had been enough juice to give him some relief from his persistent hunger. There was hardly enough here to taste but there was that small trickle. He picked up the skin with the offending stick in it and used it to mop up the trickle of blood. He licked it, running his tongue around the stick and into the folds of the dry skin. The stick stuck him in the roof of his mouth and caused another small wound. He grunted and threw the skin and sticks to the ground. He looked at it for a moment, stooped and picked it up. The skin was holding the sticks together so tightly that he couldn't pry them apart. In his years of struggling to stay alive, naked, cold, afraid, he had never considered being able to 'hold things together'. He sat on the ground and turned the skin and sticks over in his hands. He threw it on the ground and picked it up again. He tried to pull out the sticks. He chewed on it. He tried again to pull out the sticks. He sat there until the night faded into early morning. He looked more closely at the ball of skin and sticks. During the examination and the chewing and the throwing to the ground a small pebble had become caught in a fold of the rawhide where he had chewed it and it had become slightly flexible. During the continued process of holding and looking and chewing the area with the small stone had dried. Now the stone was held firmly in place next to a stick. Dried skin, a stick and a stone had become a single thing. He could throw it into the air or hard on the ground and they all stayed together as a single thing.

Many days later, the small skin and stick and rock object grasped firmly in his fist, now an object of great consideration, of great contemplation in a mind not yet able to contemplate, he began to become aware of 'holding things together'. He sat down and pulled up a length of berry bush vine. It wasn't the time of year when berries might be attached but he knew the vine and had, on many occasions eaten the berries while cautiously avoiding the thorns. He remembered that when the vines didn't have berries the thorns were soft and could be eaten. But that wasn't why he had pulled up the vine. He looked at the foot long piece of berry vine for a long time. After half a day of looking at the vine and at his surroundings he reached over and tore two large leaves from a squat bush. He looked at the leaves for a long time. He laid the leaves on the ground and put the vine on top of the leaves. He looked at it for a long time. He then put his first and only treasure, the twisted piece of skin, branches and rock on the leaves. Again, much time passed. Finally, after many aborted movements and beginnings, he picked up the skin and stick and rock and pressed the end of one of the sticks through the side of a leaf leaving a small hole. Again time passed . Finally he picked up the leaf with the hole in it and the vine. Purposefully he pushed the vine through the hole. Processes were beginning to occur inside his brain that could only be called 'creative'. Finally he picked up the second leaf, quickly punched a hole through it and then, within minutes, wove the vine through the second leaf. He held up his 'creation': Two leaves held on a section of berry vine. "Holding things together" began it's evolutionary progress to clothing (things held together); tools (things held together); constructed shelter (things held together) and, of course, weapons, other than individual sticks and stones (things held together).

With that first twisted hunk of skin, sticks and a stone began all things human.