An Inside Job Walking in a large commercial parking lot, I see a food truck pull up to the curb with the words “Gangster Cheese” painted on the side. As the staff set up shop, preparing for the soon-to-arrive lunch crowd, I find myself wondering what “gangster cheese” might be. Some type of cheese with a lot of street cred? But the truck is painted black. The logo is shadowy figures dressed in trench coats with fedoras tipped below their brows—intimidating, old-time gangster images, not hip-hop stars and rappers. An employee sets up a sign that contains the menu: grilled cheese sandwiches. This doesn’t add up. To bring order to my mind, I want to stop and tell these cheese gangsters to change the name because I am pretty sure that a buttery grilled cheese sandwich is not the food of evil forces; it’s what’s for lunch in heaven. Before penicillin, it cured a lot of sick kids and made life worth living. But even in my state of mental confusion, I still have enough judgment to realize that asking a gangster of any kind to change their name would be a gamble, and it might end with me buried in concrete. I sleep on it. My rested mind remembers that before cheese kills you, it makes you an addict, clogging your arteries and sealing off your colon. Aha! These cheese gangsters don’t cut your heart out, they wait for it to explode. What a scheme! They take your money and let you die a slow death even as they keep you coming back for more. It’s the perfect crime--all the evidence is digested and flushed down the toilet. I guess of all the ways to die, death by buttery grilled cheese sandwiches is not so bad. It’s better than having your bones broken one-by-one. I decide to go undercover before drawing any final conclusions. I infiltrate some local cartels of cafeteria ladies and stay-at-home moms. In the process, I learn that this is a big operation that goes all the way to the top. It’s a syndicate too big for this little gumshoe, and so I wind up my investigation. The findings? A buttery grilled cheese sandwich is the original ecstasy, a recipe the gods intended for heaven. With the size of their operation and their many channels of distribution, I conclude that these cunning, cheese-trafficking gangsters must have someone on the inside!
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It seems that in 2025 the fizz went out the cola, the sparkle out of the water, the bubbly out of the champagne, the taste of the brew fell flat and repugnant. In a world already suffering from loneliness, the politics widened the divide and silenced good people. At least that’s how it felt to me much of the year. My joy and energy dissipated with every news headline. People became quiet and more distant even more so than during the height of the COVID pandemic. Many days were complete radio silence. Early in the political year I wrote to my elected representatives and reminded them of the words of Voltaire: “Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.” Absurdity certainly describes 2025 every bit as much as the word of the year: SLOP. We cringe and squint at the atrocities that have already occurred, atrocities sanctioned by our elected representatives with their eyes wide open. It is easy to feel hopeless. Perhaps there are people in power who put their hope in our hopelessness. Today, 80 mile per hour winds are howling through the trees and rattling my windows. I try to picture the absurdities and atrocities of 2025 being blown away, the strong wind a cleansing breath from God. And today I pray that the year 2026 will spark some collective effervescence. We will sparkle again with life, laughter, togetherness, and actions that better serve ourselves, our neighbors, and the greater good. As J. K. Rowling once wrote of her 200 rejections of the Harry Potter series, “rock bottom can be a solid foundation.” With that thought in my mind, I’d like to offer a suggestion for next year’s word of the year. How about YET? Another writer, Paulette Perhach wrote: “I’d like to submit YET as your new favorite word. YET tells you that just because you don’t have something now doesn’t mean you won’t have it in the future if you work for it.” We can “pull ourselves from the ruin of our choices.” Let’s make YET our working vocabulary for the year 2026. Let’s put down our phones and limit our social media. Let’s be mindful of our use of resources and who and what we are supporting every time we pick up our phones, shop, read, listen, or participate in some way. Let’s stay aware that social media works by driving up outrage through clickbait and “likes” that sell advertising. Let’s tell the social media giants whose guiding philosophy is “move fast and break things,” that we are not careless people. We build things; we don’t break things. Let us pride ourselves not on our excess but on ensuring that each person has enough. Let’s demand a government that aligns with the well-being of its citizens and not just the wealthiest few. Let’s demand that government do more to prepare for the changes AI is bringing as well as the impending loss of government revenue previously collected from human workers through income tax. Let’s tax the robots. You can’t give tax breaks to the wealthiest citizens and then allow them to discard the human work force and the tax revenue that hardworking Americans create to pay the federal and state bills and support the programs that serve us all. We’ve already experienced how the poor planning for and regulation of social media has turned it into a hate machine, destroyed science and expertise with disinformation, and dismantled democracy here and around the world. We haven’t stopped it…YET. Let’s bring an end to profits over people, a policy that has led to our rising discontent. Executive reimbursement has been tied to short-term profits and has risen over 900%. CEOs and corporate America grow wealthy while making products that destroy us, our jobs, and the environment. Find out where your retirement funds are invested, where you are a shareholder. Vote, ask questions. Think before shopping. Democracy must be something we deliberately practice and that includes civility, kindness, tolerance, and expressions of gratitude for what and who are working. Call people by name. Support local businesses. Local shops serve the public good by keeping our neighborhoods lively and safe, by giving us places to gather and people to meet. They need our support. And support our community spaces like parks and rec centers and libraries while standing up to the new “aggressive architecture” that makes it unpleasant to gather in these common areas. We will share the fate of what happens next. So let it be a shared love and concern for ourselves, our neighbors, their families and ours, and the safety and health of our communities. Let’s walk together, pray together, cook together. Let’s make things beautiful together. Times are hard for so many, but that doesn’t mean we can’t enrich the times and places in which we live. We will write the story of our times. We will write the story of democracy’s future. Let’s toast to the New Year. Let’s toast to collective effervescence, to the new you, the new me, the new we, and to the power of YET. …and the fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves… - William Shakespeare Chapter One “So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem…He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born…She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.” Luke 2:4-7 Away in a manger, no crib for a bed, The little Lord Jesus laid down his sweet head. The stars in the bright sky looked down where he lay, The little Lord Jesus asleep on the hay. - William J. Kirkpatrick “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.” Matthew 2:1-2 Then the traveler in the dark Thanks you for your tiny spark; He could not see which way to go, If you did not twinkle so. Twinkle, twinkle, little star, How I wonder what you are! - Jane Taylor "For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me.” Matthew 25:35 This little light of mine, I’m going to let it shine… Everywhere I go, I’m going to let it shine… Jesus gave it to me, I’m going to let it shine. - Attributed to Henry Dixon Loes Chapter Two “When I am back in the White House, we will use every tool, lever, and authority to get the homeless off our streets.” – Donald J. Trump, Former President “They’re eating the dogs!” - Donald J. Trump, Candidate for President, During Televised Debate “We’re going the wrong way if we keep taking in garbage into our country. Ilhan Omar is garbage. Her friends are garbage.” - Donald J. Trump, President O stars, and dreams, and gentle night; O night and stars, return! And hide me from the hostile light That does not warm, but burns; That drains the blood of suffering men; Drinks tears, instead of dew; Let me sleep through this blinding reign, And only wake with you! - Emily Bronte An Epilogue “I remember: it happened yesterday, or eternities ago. A young Jewish boy discovered the Kingdom of Night. I remember his bewilderment, I remember his anguish. It all happened so fast. The ghetto. The deportation. The sealed cattle car… “This is what I say to the young Jewish boy wondering what I have done with his years…We know that every moment is a moment of grace, every hour an offering; not to share them would mean to betray them... “Our lives no longer belong to us alone; they belong to all those who need us desperately.” - Elie Wiesel, Holocaust Survivor, 1986 Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech Star light, star bright, First star I see tonight, I wish I may, I wish I might, Have this wish I wish tonight. - Anonymous … the more confusing technology becomes, the more comfortable I am with death. Because when I’m dead, it won’t matter that I can’t turn on the TV. –Kristin van Ogtrop Technology has gotten so far ahead of me that it is not remotely possible that I will catch up. I think the last major innovation in technology that I truly understood and still know how to use is the Post-It note. When I was young, “remote” meant that something was far away like the moon or that something was improbable like becoming a rock star. But now much of our daily lives is remote. We have remote controls, remote access, remote learning, remote health care, and remote work. Remote is here, there, and everywhere. Ironically, connectivity is making us more remote. It seems that everywhere can be accessed from a person’s living room. The couch, which once symbolized the examination of one’s interior life, is the new symbol of the remote world. I find all of this confusing in theory as well as in practice. My remote devices are covered with buttons and apps that operate who-knows-what. I press the “on” button and algorithms get busy making choices for me. Technology has gotten inside my brain, spies on my activities, tracks my location, and listens to my conversations in order to recommend videos, music, movies, and most of all—advertisements. My phone auto-corrects my text messages so that I am never really sure that the message I sent was what I intended to express. All of this adds to my self-doubt and frustration. Recently, I received an automatic text message from my doctor’s office asking, “Have you arrived yet?” What?! I was still in the shower! When I did arrive, there were new signs posted that parking was no longer free and must be paid for with an app. I had no idea what to do next. I turned to the only remote relationship I have ever trusted: prayer. But that didn’t seem to be working. I wondered if I was behind the times on that too. Is God on Facebook now? Can I still reach him if I am not on Facebook? And if I am not on Facebook, can he still like me? And what are his statistics? How many friends does he have? And is he still the influencer he used to be? It was not a helpful flow of thought for dealing with a parking crisis. Even as I feared that I might die in the parking lot trying to figure out how to pay for my space, it occurred to me that my phone may have lured me to the remotest place possible. As I circled the block chanting the F-word, I had to accept that this was not just a parking dilemma but an existential crisis: God may no longer be in charge. And so I did the most technologically advanced thing I could think to do. I screamed into my phone: “Hey, Google! Am I in hell?” It was the best of times, it was the worst of times… - Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities Preparations for a mid-day meeting delayed my morning walk. By the time the meeting ended and I was free, rush hour had begun. As I stepped onto the shared-use path a cold wind whipped my face and stung my eyes. The whoosh of speeding cars, the squealing tires and the blaring horns were added blows to my bleeding senses. My spirit deflated like a punctured lung. I thought of turning around for home, but then I stopped, closed my eyes, and took a moment to center myself and reclaim my purpose and my enthusiasm. When I opened my eyes what I saw was a brilliant blue sky and puffy white clouds surrounded by haloes of gold from the setting sun. Crisp red and orange leaves skipped across the path in front of me, and I thought to myself, it is true: the best and the worst, they can both be present at the same time and in the same place. The daily news can be as jarring as the cold wind that whipped my face. Somedays it is easy to believe that the bad news is all the news there is, that it is indeed the worst of times in a Tale of Two Countries, but then something happens that expands my focus and restores my faith. Two such stories recently reached me. With all the worries about loss of essential benefits such as SNAP and healthcare amidst an affordable housing crisis and rising grocery costs, a friend sent me this story about a restaurant in Marion, Ohio where a few afternoons a week the restaurant offers free pasta dinners to families with the tag line, “Your children don’t need to know.” Quoting the article and Bucci’s Facebook post: Bucci’s said, “We love this community, and we’re thankful to be in a position to do something small that might make things a little easier for someone else. We can’t get through this without each other. Love you all.” A few days later, I saw another story about a man and his two young sons who live in Whitehall, Pennsylvania. They started a small food pantry on their front porch and received a nice donation from an anonymous donor. The Whitehall dad said, “Making a food pantry is no different than me inviting you over to my house for dinner. Come grab a meal. Come grab a drink. Come grab what you need. I’m happy to have you.” These stories were the medicine I needed, medicine that did not just restore my faith but invigorated it. I was reminded that God created man and placed that man in a garden. God saw that the man was lonely, and God created a companion for him. God never intended for us to face life alone even in paradise. Life was meant to be served up family style. I want to hold onto these stories whenever I am inclined to become a doubting Thomas. Just because there is a moment of darkness, I do not want to doubt that there is light ahead. I am a believer, and this is the hard work of faith: to keep believing even in the darkness, to trust in goodness even when the bad guys seem to be winning, and to act with conviction by committing ourselves to loving others with joy and enthusiasm. There is a story in the Book of Matthew about the apostles out at night on a stormy sea. They were far from shore and whipped by wind and waves. Exhausted, they looked into the darkness and they saw Jesus walking toward them on the water. Jesus said, “Take courage. Don’t be afraid.” I am thinking there are some folks in Marion, Ohio and Whitehall, Pennsylvania who have heard these same words from people they believe can walk on water. There is a new endurance sport taking over America, one that builds both strength and resistance. It’s a marathon in which you run for office—over and over again. To qualify you must be rotten to your core and willing to test the endurance of your fellow citizens. To un-seed the current record holder, you must be able to convey an astonishing 3.43 lies a minute. Participation requires an excessive preoccupation with yourself and your own needs as it is an expensive hobby. Many people get started in the sport by running from the law. Once you have escaped all legal consequences, you enter the zone, and it becomes easy and addictive. The best candidates for the sport are individuals who do not carry excess weight. To get in shape for the starting line, experts recommend shrinking the size of your heart and the weight of your conscience. The equipment necessary includes a Jim on your corner along with a number of different dumbbells. You must be able do about 120 reps, bench a few hundred judges, and wear the official cruelT-shirt. You will know you have reached endurance status when everyone around you feels the burn. Must be 35 years of age and have proof of citizenship to participate. Tuesday, November 4, 2025 is Election Day in America. Exercise your power. Well, we are deep in football season. College games occupy our Saturdays, NFL games our Sundays and our Monday nights. Game 1 of baseball’s World Series is behind us and the NBA season is before us. Our great leader, #47, is still teeing off on the weekends. Everywhere I turn it’s all about balls. My mind might be fertile ground or just a trash mountain, but as you know, I like to ponder life’s big questions, and so the steady roll of balls leaves me pondering another one of life’s mysteries: What is our societal fascination with balls? I would Google it, but I fear the pop-up ads that would follow, and I don’t want my children to visit and turn on my YouTube TV to find a menu of X-rated videos. How did this dedication to the spherical life get started? As they scavenged for food, were cavemen fascinated by the roundest rocks? Did some caveman encounter a rolling stone and take off in hot pursuit…something else in the wild to be tamed and brought under man’s control? Or did he see a smooth round rock rolling down hill and say to himself, “Hey, that stone is not gathering any moss, I think I will chase it, and when I catch it, I am going to kick it into my enemy’s cave. Maybe he will kick it back to me.” Or, “I think I will hit this stone with a stick and then run home as fast as I can.” Maybe cavemen had a lot of time on their hands when they weren’t hunting or fleeing for their lives. I am not sure which of our early ancestors passed the ball, but sports metaphors aren’t just for fun and games. They entered the business world a long time ago, and they appear to be a requirement for business and motivation. We are advised to get the ball rolling and keep our eye on the ball. We go to bat or carry the ball. Sometimes we have a lot of balls to juggle. We cover the bases. Sometimes we drop the ball or wait while the ball is in the air. Occasionally, we slam dunk. On the downside, we might drop the ball or get behind the eight ball. Under pressure we might make a Hail Mary pass (and you don’t even have to be Catholic to do so). Other times, the ball’s in their court and all we can do is wait-- unless we are off base entirely. High profile male ball handlers are the most well-known of celebrities. A person might win a Nobel Prize and save millions of lives with their discoveries, and no one knows their name, but hit a ball out of the park or score a touchdown and your name is a household word more familiar than that simple, old-fashioned word: eggs. Everyone will be wearing your image or number on their t-shirt. And people will pay a pretty penny for the winning game ball. It has been harder for women to get in the game. People just don’t seem willing to pay to watch women carry the balls. I did a quick, informal survey about why this is so. What I learned is that the women’s game lacks the level of “explosiveness” and “aggression” seen in the men’s games. Perhaps testosterone explains it or maybe men have just had more time on their hands to develop these game-playing qualities. Who knows what those cavemen were really doing when they went off to hunt. Women were having babies, nursing babies, hauling water, tending fires, gathering food, and cooking and cleaning all while chasing off the occasional predator; never a moment to spare. And the early beauty regimen might have been time-consuming with no quick showers or hair dryers. Let’s face it: women have always been overextended and tired. In our current spheres of influence, all you need is to have been a once-famous male athlete. The doors blow open for you. Having played a ball game qualifies aging former players to be owners, coaches, commentators, broadcasters, senators, governors, motivational speakers, and general experts on everything. Who needs an education and specialized knowledge and experience when you are a modern day Zeus? And so we roll along with no job too big for a former ball handler. Seems nuts to me. |
AuthorLilli-ann Buffin Archives
January 2026
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