• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content

James M. Redwine

  • Books
  • Columns
  • Events
  • About

Romans

Aposematism

February 22, 2020 by Jim Leave a Comment

Aposematism. “Fair warning.” That is what that long Ancient Greek derived word means. “Stay away!” Or as it applies to skunks, “I stink; get back”. When one sees the white stripes among a skunk’s black fur Mother Nature apparently believes that is sufficient warning of skunks’ antisocial character. The Greeks used the term, aposematic, to identify any animal that had a way to warn off enemies.

My recent experience with skunks has led me to question whether skunks understand the “stay away” thing should go both ways. It also confirms my long held conclusion that the Ancient Greeks and Romans had already discovered over 2,000 years ago almost everything worth knowing.

The Ancient Romans provided the term for the scientific family we call skunks. It is Mephitidae which was based on the Roman god that referred to the malodorous gases emitting from swamps and volcanoes. It appears skunks had infiltrated the greatest cultures of Western Civilization. Of course, skunks and their relatives have not spared any other great cultures either.

But, Gentle Reader, we are not concerned with etymology, the origin of words, but with the origin of behavior, particularly skunk behavior as it relates to the family of skunks that has apparently decided Peg and I are their friends and that our home is, also, their home. What happened to that age-old skunk/human dynamic of don’t bother us and we won’t bother (or spray) you?

For three weeks now a family of skunks has been determined to live with us. This might not have been intolerable if the family of opossums and one squirrel that had already chosen our cabin as their home would have just moved on and given our crawl space to the invading skunks. However, reasonable retreat was not the opossums’ and squirrel’s decision. War was declared and you already know what the Dooms Day war weapon of skunks is. The skunks beneath our cabin deploy their spray frequently every night between about 10:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. depending upon the aggression of the opossums and the squirrel. Of course, Peg and I, whose only role has been to provide a warm dry area for all involved, get the collateral damage from this domestic terrorism. The stench wafts up through the floor and pervades every inch of our living space.

Peg used to tell me I needed to understand  the competing animals are simply some of our fellow mammals acting naturally. My attitude started out negative and has rapidly escalated to that of Bill Murray’s as the golf course groundskeeper in the movie Caddyshack and his battles with gophers. I just want them out from under our cabin and out of our lives. I realized I had slipped over the edge when I began to visibly rejoice each time I’d pass a dead skunk flattened on the highway. And Peg’s “tsk, tsk” admonition to me finally changed last night.

About 2:00 a.m. Peg heard a noise and got up to investigate. She opened the bedroom door that leads out to our porch. Fortunately she had switched on the outside light first. As she gingerly put a foot out the door a skunk came around the corner and headed into our home. Peg screamed, “Skunk!”. I grabbed my shot gun. The skunk kept coming. Peg slammed the door just as the skunk’s nose hit the glass. Peg and I are finally on the same page. Terminix, traps and anti-critter sprays and pellets are now our mantra. One positive thing is the opossums have decided they are through fighting and they and the squirrel have “moved on”. Now we just need to convince the skunks, starting with this “adorable” white with black stripe specimen that we caught last night. See the Euell Gibbons-like photograph Peg took.

Skunk!

Share this:

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)

Filed Under: Females/Pick on Peg, Gavel Gamut, JPeg Osage Ranch, Personal Fun, War Tagged With: aposematism, Bill Murray, Caddyshack, Dooms Day war, Euell Gibbons, Gentle Reader, Greeks, James M. Redwine, Jim Redwine, Mephitidae, one squirrel, opossums, Romans, skunks, spray, stench

Merry Christmas to Us

December 27, 2018 by Jim Leave a Comment

If the message of Christmas were simply gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh, etc., etc., it would have died out about as unceremoniously as the current stock market. Therefore, we should probably consider if there are other possibilities.

When the Jews were conquered by the Romans they reacted as most oppressed people would. Their cultural myths concentrated on deliverance. In general, deliverance from an omnipotent force can take three approaches: armed rebellion; assimilation; and/or peaceful coexistence.

To some of the Hebrews their hoped-for messiah would be a warrior who would throw off the Roman rule. To others the approach was more of total capitulation. But for many the thought was a Prince of Peace would provide the best hope. To fight Rome, as the destruction of the Jewish temple in 70 A.D. showed, was to court annihilation. As the Jewish historian Josephus Flavius chronicled, revolt by the Jews brought total devastation to their society.

On the other hand, the Romans and Jews of that time did not appear to be interested in peaceful coexistence except upon terms set by Rome. That left real deliverance from bondage for the Jewish people to be more metaphysical, that is, through philosophy not armed resistance. And it took 2,000 years, the horrors of WWII and the benevolence of the world’s new Rome, the United States of America, before Jewish self-determination could be realized. Still true peace as called for by Jesus is elusive. The Middle East continues to be an area where armed rebellion is both ubiquitous and futile.

Perhaps we should give the true message of Christmas a chance. I know President Trump has his faults and I carry no brief for much of what our government does in our name. However, to withdraw from foreign conflicts that simply kill thousands, destroy cultures and cost trillions appears to me to be the course Jesus would call for. Merry Christmas and welcome home to our soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and wherever else we are engulfed in endless counterproductive conflicts. And if we really are the new Rome maybe we should learn from the military fiascoes of that ancient one.

The debacle on Wall Street might best be addressed not by quarrelling over interest rates but by investing our treasure in ourselves instead of squandering it in the vain pursuit of a Pax Americana.

Share this:

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)

Filed Under: America, Christmas, Democracy, Gavel Gamut, Martyrs, Middle East, Patriotism, War Tagged With: armed rebellion, assimilation, debacle on Wall Street, frankincense, gold, Hebrews, hope-for Messiah, invest our treasure in ourselves, James M. Redwine, Jesus, Jews, Jim Redwine, Josephus Flavius, Merry Christmas to Us, Middle East, myrrh, Pax Americana, peaceful coexistence, President Trump, Prince of Peace, Romans, Rome's military fiascoes, stock market, true message of Christmas, withdraw from wars, WWII

Jesus of Palestine

January 1, 2016 by Jim Leave a Comment

During these Twelve Days of Christmas my thoughts have been occupied with the birth of Jesus. According to Matthew, Chapter 2, and Luke, Chapter 2, Jesus was born in Bethlehem during the reign of Herod the Great, which was from 37 B.C. to 4 B.C. The Roman emperor Pompeii conquered the area of Palestine, which included Bethlehem, in 63 B.C. Bethlehem is an ancient city whose history dates back a thousand years before Christ.

Today Bethlehem is in the West Bank area of Palestine about ten kilometers south of modern day Israel, which was carved out of Palestine in 1948 by the United Nations.

Jesus was born in the city of Bethlehem. Bethlehem was then and is now in the country of Palestine. Some who wish to deny ancient or biblical or Roman or contemporary borders may cling to the fiction that Palestine never existed and Bethlehem today is part of the so-called “Palestinian Authority”. Such legerdemain simply pours fuel on the conflagration that is the Middle East. Call it a rose or call it a thorn; Palestine is Palestine.

Just as so many who reach our shores from foreign lands know, if your child is born in the United States, he/she is an American citizen. Ergo, either Jesus was born and died a Palestinian or, if one is a believer, Jesus was born and still is a Palestinian.

When the National Judicial College had me teach fourteen Palestinian judges and lawyers, including Palestine’s Attorney General who lived in Bethlehem, I found them evenly divided between Christians and Muslims. The Attorney General was Palestinian Christian and very proud to live in the “Little Town” of Jesus’s birth. He held out hope the Prince of Peace would return and bring peace to His birthplace and the world.

In this season of hoped for peace, my thoughts have turned to the origin of our troubles in the Middle East. Until the country of Palestine was occupied by forces enabled by our power and money, America had no problems with Palestinians. There was and is no just reason for us to help oppress Palestinians. We have somehow gradually stumbled our way into a morass of injustice and intrigue.

It would be interesting to see what today’s government of Israel would do with a group of rabble rousers such as the twelve apostles as led by that radical Palestinian, Jesus. Would Jesus today, just as Jesus two thousand years ago, be arrested at the behest of the Israeli hierarchy and held in jail?

Perhaps the people of contemporary Jerusalem would call for the release of some other alleged criminal, such as a contemporary Barabbas, and call for the crucifixion of Jesus as a terrorist. If so, would we in America finally have the scales fall from our eyes or would we play the part of new Romans and be complicit? At a minimum, now that we find ourselves in this deep hole, maybe we should at least stop digging.

Anyway, Merry Twelve Days of Christmas to all and to all a peaceful New Year.

 

Share this:

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)

Filed Under: Gavel Gamut, Martyrs, Middle East, National Judicial College Tagged With: Attorney General of Palestine, Barabbas, Bethlehem, Christians, crucifixion of Jesus, Herod the Great, Israel, James M. Redwine, Jesus of Palestine, Jim Redwine, Middle East, Muslims, National Judicial College, Palestinian Authority, Pompeii, Prince of Peace, Romans, Twelve Days of Christmas, West Bank

© 2020 James M. Redwine

loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.